ROS summary

This page is dedicated to two classes of ROS elements: commands (i.e. programs that you can run from the command line to perform specific tasks, such as roscd) and external programs (i.e. software dedicated to specific functions that is run separately when needed, such as rviz).

The most commonly used of these are described in a condensed form by the ROS Official Cheat Sheet.

ROS filesystem commands

• To change directory directly to a package or stack directory:

roscd package_name

or

roscd stack_name

ROS visualization system - rviz

• To open rviz you will need roscore running in background (execute roscore in a different shell) and then run the following command:

rosrun rviz rviz

The rviz interface will pop up, to visualize something published by a node you will have to

• Add a type by clicking Add and selecting a display type (e.g.: poing cloud)
• Set the topic that you want to listen (the one specified in the node that is publishing)
• Set in the Global Options menu the desired Fixed Frame (typically /map )