ROS robotics news: April 2015 Archives

Save the date: ROSCon 2015 will be in Hamburg, Germany October 3rd and 4th

By Tully Foote on April 30, 2015 1:28 PM | No Comments | No TrackBacks

We're pleased to announce that we will be hosting ROSCon 2015 October 3rd and 4th in Hamburg Germany, immediately following IROS.

ROSCon 2015 will be a chance for ROS developers of all levels, beginner to expert, to spend an extraordinary weekend learning from and networking with the ROS community. Get tips and tricks from experts, network, and share ideas with fellow developers from around the globe.

ROSCon is a developers' conference, in the model of PyCon and BoostCon. Similar to last year, the two-day program will comprise technical talks and tutorials that will introduce you to new tools and libraries, as well as teach you more about the ones you already know. The bulk of the program will be 30-40 minute presentations (some may be longer or shorter).

To find out more about ROSCon please visit: http://roscon.ros.org/ It has all the past events and more details about ROSCon 2015 will be posted there as they become available.

Your ROSCon 2015 Organizing Committee

You can reach the organizing committee at: roscon-2015-oc@osrfoundation.org

Clearpath and Christie Make 3D Video Game with Robots

By Tully Foote on April 28, 2015 11:57 AM | No Comments | No TrackBacks

From Meghan Hennessey

Clearpath Robotics, a leader in unmanned vehicle robotics, has combined resources with Christie^®, one of the most innovative visual technologies companies in the world, to create a three-dimensional video game using robots. The pairing of Clearpath and Christie bridges two technologies, from unrelated fields, to create an interactive experience in a way that has never been done before.

The project was produced during Clearpath's "hack week," where team members experiment and innovate with new technology and ideas. Computer graphics were displayed on the floor using Christie's 3D projection mapping equipment to create a digital arena, while robots dueled with laser beams. Clearpath was inspired by a project from MIT; however, they wanted to create a version using open source software and run as a completely interactive program.

"Teaming up with Christie allowed us to experiment with the latest 3D projection mapping technology in combination with our Jackal robots and open source software. This was our recipe for an augmented reality video game," said Ryan Gariepy, Co-Founder & Chief Technology Officer at Clearpath Robotics. "Combining both of our technologies resulted in a one-of-a-kind experience that was fun to work on and even more fun to play with."

Augmented reality is a term used to describe the superimposing of a computer image in the real world.

Utilizing Christie's overhead 3D projectors, the Clearpath team created an overlay under their Jackal unmanned ground vehicles to display weapons, recharging shields, hitpoints, and sound effects for a two player (or human vs. A.I.) game.

For this project, Christie provided four Christie HD14K-M 14,000 lumens 3DLP® projectors and two cameras. The projectors use Christie AutoCal™ software and have Christie Twist™ software embedded right in. Christie rigged the four projectors in a 2 x 2 configuration on the ceiling of our warehouse. The cameras captured what was happening on the floor and sent that information on the Christie AutoCal™ software, which then automatically aligned and blended the four projectors into one, giant, seamless 30-foot projection-mapped digital canvas. The Christie hardware and software, in conjunction with two of Clearpath's Jackal robots and computer system allowed for the augmented reality experience to take place.

For more details and a video of the project visit http://www.clearpathrobotics.com/blog/hack-week-augmented-reality.

Silicon Valley ROS Workshop - May 2

By Tully Foote on April 28, 2015 9:33 AM | No Comments | No TrackBacks

From Ed Katz via ros-users@

ROS Training Session Course 101

The Beagle Bone Black (BBB) development board is a great way to begin using ROS for any size Robot project. We have designed a class to get you past the steep learning curve so you can start using your BBB and ROS effectively. This course will focus on basic IO, motor control and switch sensing. At the end of the class you will have:

A working BBB running the latest ROS
A reference BBB interface for a 2 motor controller (we will be using LEDs instead of motors)
Your laptop running ROS via a virtual machine

Time & Place: - Saturday, May 2, 2015 - 9:00 AM to 3:00 PM - HackerDojo - Mountain View, CA

Sign-up here: Eventbrite

More Info here: http://ros-training.com/

We appreciate your interest!

We look forward to seeing you at our next workshop!

ROS Jade Turtle Logo and Release T-shirt

By Tully Foote on April 20, 2015 12:33 PM | No Comments | No TrackBacks

With each release of ROS we have a tradition of having a logo and making t-shirts. ROS Jade Turtle is coming out in May. Show your ROS colors and support this tradition! Visit the Teespring Campaign page here to order your shirt.

Proceeds from shirt sales go to supporting the costs associated with developing and maintaining ROS, including hosting the wiki and running the build farm.

There are both mens and womens sizes as well as hoodies available.

Order now and if this campaign is funded we expect the shirts to arrive approximately when ROS Jade Turtle is released. The campaign closes on May 11th don't wait too long to order.

Here's a copy of the full logo:

Visualizer of delta robots using ROS and EtherCAT

By Tully Foote on April 15, 2015 10:55 AM | No Comments | No TrackBacks

From Diego Escudero

Last year we started thinking about using ROS as development framework to make our life easy when we develop our own machine controller, the NJ controller that integrates Robotics functions.

During the initial analysis we defined four use cases and decided to implement one of them. The selected one was the visualizer of parallel robots that will be used during the system testing phase of the controller. The work was done by F. Martí during his winter internship at OMRON Industrial Automation.

The NJ controller is programmed using the SYSMAC Studio IDE and controls 64 servo-drives through the EtherCAT field bus. Due to that, the visualizer is installed on a normal computer with an EtherCAT slave card; and it runs on Ubuntu 14.04 LTS and ROS Indigo.

The visualizer is composed by two main parts:

The simulator of EtherCAT slaves.
The ROS meta-package that visualizes the family of delta robots.

The EtherCAT slave simulator reads the axes commanded positions sent by the controller, forwards them to a ROS node, and closes the loop providing feedback to the controller. After that the ROS meta-package calculates the full positions of the delta robots based on the provided positions and visualizes them using rviz.

In this video below you can see the system working at the Robotics Lab of the Motion Development Team that is placed in Barcelona (Spain).

Visualiser of Delta robots using ROS and EtherCAT from FelipMarti on Vimeo.

ROS-Industrial Training

By Ugo Cupcic on April 13, 2015 7:00 AM | No Comments | No TrackBacks

from Christina Gomez, via ros-news

Greetings ROS Community,

Southwest Research Institute is coordinating with Caterpillar to host a ROS-Industrial Training Class April 29 - May 2, 2015 in Peoria, Illinois. Wednesday at 1 pm, we begin with a tour of a Caterpillar manufacturing plant, and end with a dinner in downtown Peoria. The detailed agenda can be found at the ROS-I website.

The classroom portion is similar to the training held last year with the same curriculum and an added session and lab option for Descartes. Please bring a laptop to the class with the ROS-I training Virtual Machine pre-installed. This class is geared toward individuals with a programming background who seek to learn to compose their own ROS nodes. Day 1 will be split into two tracks: the ROS Basics track will focus on introductory ROS skills; the Advanced track will focus on camera/perception topics. Day 2 will examine motion planning using MoveIt! as well as the Descartes planner and Perception concepts. Day 3 offers a lab programming exercise (with a choice of):

Simple Perception Lab
Simple MoveIt! Application
Simple Descartes Application.

Registration is now open: http://rosindustrial.org/training-registration.

Consulting position at a new venture in Israel

By Tully Foote on April 10, 2015 10:53 AM | No Comments | No TrackBacks

From Deins Mashkevich

ROS consultant is needed to adapt an existing robot model to run on ROS.
Tasks include developing a full ROS computation graph, and a high-level API that will be usable by a high-level software using ROS services.
This is an unique opportunity to do things your own way, developing all ROS-related functionality from A to Z.

Skills needed:
- Proficiency in C/C++ development
- Proficiency in a Linux environment
- Extensive experience with ROS
- Experience with development for microcontrollers and electrical engineering a plus

This is a time-limited position with option for permanent employment afterwards.
Local candidates preferred, but will consider a remote arrangement.

For more information, contact:
denis@smilingclam.com
+972-544-567856

ROS-I 3-yrs. Montage Video

By Ugo Cupcic on April 6, 2015 9:18 PM | No Comments | No TrackBacks

From Paul Hvass, posted on ROS-Industrial blog

Thanks to those in the ROS-I community who contributed to the ROS-I 3 yrs. Montage video! We would like to ackowledge:

Calibration of camera to robot: SwRI
Denso VS060 path planning using ROS-Industrial Cartesian Planner: TORK
Cartesian Planner plug-in for MoveIt!: BioRobotics Institute at Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna/MicroBio Robotics Institute at the Italian Institute of Technology/SwRI/GSoC
Process Simulate to ROS bridge: Siemens
Path planner optimization and planning request adapter plug-in for MoveIt!: IDEXX/RIC-Americas
Block pick and place: Technolution
Palletizing unknown products: Alten Mechatronics
Plastic crate depalletizing with lightweight robot: Intermodalics
Pick and place with obstacle avoidance: Deere and Co.
Factory-in-a-day, EU FP7 Factory of the Future 2013 Programme (FP7-2013-NMP-ICT-FoF)
Robotic 3D scanning: Institute Maupertuis
ROS-I training class pick and place exercise: RIC-Americas
ROS-Industrial Consortium Robotic Routing FTP, Testing at CNRC: RIC-Americas
ROS-Industrial Consortium Robotic Blending FTP Milestone 2 Update: RIC-Americas
8-DOF microscope positioning for TEM: Alten Mechatronics
Multiscale teleoperation: UT Austin Nuclear and Applied Robotics Group
Mobile robotic 3D scanning: UT Austin Nuclear and Applied Robotics Group
Rob@Work3 logistics: Fraunhofer IPA
Euler automated warehousing: SwRI
PRACE dual-arm robot: Fraunhofer IPA
YouBots pick and place multiple arm cooperation: NIST
Dual arm robot coordinated motion: Fraunhofer IPA/Yaskawa Motoman Robotics
BMDA3 dual arm robot: Fraunhofer IPA/Yaskawa Motoman Robotics/SwRI
Rangar TT: Blue Force Robotics

SLAM Engineer at PAL Robotics

By Tully Foote on April 1, 2015 5:14 PM | No Comments | No TrackBacks

From Luca Marchionni via ros-users@

COMPANY DESCRIPTION

PAL Robotics is a robotics company developing humanoid service robots. Our
goal is to develop humanoids that can perform useful tasks in the real
world. We are a young and multidisciplinary team of highly motivated
engineers, that have successfully developed robots used for research in several universities around the world.

JOB DESCRIPTION

PAL Robotics is looking for a highly motivated research engineer in the area of SLAM and autonomous navigation.

The selected individual will be responsible for developing, integrating and maintaining the autonomous navigation system

on Pal Robotics humanoid robots both with wheels and legs. The robots are supposed
to be working in real environments and for this reason safety, robustness,
fault detection and recovery should be taken into account during the
project design and implementation process.
Primary duties:

- Maintenance of the current PAL Robotics navigation system

- Long term navigation
- Autonomous Localization in crowded environment by using laser, vision,
wifi sensor fusion
- People aware Path Planning and Trajectory Execution

- SLAM extension to Multi-Mapping and Multi-Robot
- Code QA through Unit Tests

Further duties:

- Functional testing on simulation environment
- Stress test in real environments

Mandatory Requirements

- Master's degree in Computer Science/ Control / AI
- Good C++ programming skills in Linux OS
- Knowledge about SLAM algorithms
- Proactive team working attitude
- Good communication skills (at least in English)

Desired Requirements

- Good knowledge of ROS
- Experience with real robotic hardware
- Experience with revision control systems (git)
- Experience installing and configuring Ubuntu or any other Linux
distribution.
- Experience with 3D robotics simulation (Gazebo)

Job conditions

- The team is located in Barcelona, Spain.
- The salary will be evaluated according to the relevant experience of
the candidate.

Contact details

If you're interested, please submit your resume to recruit@pal-robotics.com.
Please specify the job code JOB-2015-003 and job name in the email subject file.

April 2015 Archives