ROS Hacks Repo

Overview

The repository is designed to make ROS developer's life easier. After the installation usefull aliases and functions will be added to the terminal. Everything was tested on Ubuntu 18.04.2 with ROS Melodic & ROS2 Dashing.

Installation

Make sure that tmux and python-catkin-tools is installed:

sudo apt install tmux python-catkin-tools

Clone the repo into some folder, for example:

git clone https://github.com/yossioo/ROS-Hacks.git ~/.ROS-Hacks

or if you like SSH😉:

git clone git@github.com:yossioo/ROS-Hacks.git ~/.ROS-Hacks

Navigate to the directory and execute the setup.sh script.

cd ~/.ROS-Hacks;  bash setup.sh

The ~/.inputrc file is saved to ~/.inputrc.bak prior to being overwritten.

Defaults for ROS versions are: Melodic for ROS1, and Dashing for ROS2. Adjust in aliases.sh if needed.

Terminal shortcuts

The shortcuts can be run in a new terminal after the installation. Note: re-sourcing ~/.bashrc isn't enough.

Complete list of the shortcuts can be seen in inputrc file. Few of them are presented below:

Shortcut	Executed command	Description
F3	select_ws	Displays ROS workspace selection dialog.
Shift-F3	prompt_new_ws	Displays new ROS workspace creation dialog.
F5	source ~/.bashrc	You know what it does :)
F9	rebuild_curr_ws	Re-builds the currently selected workspace and sources it.
Shift-F12	set-quick-command	Saves currently typed-in command for quick-launch1.
F12	exec-quick-command	Executes the saved command in detached tmux session.
...	....	.......

¹ The function is primarily targeted for quick launching and killing of Gazebo worlds using various roslaunch commands. A quick execution commands are saved for each workspace separately.

Example of usage of Quick Command: Type in terminal roslaunch gazebo_ros empty_world.launch, hit Shift-F12. The command will be saved for currently sourced workspace. Hit F12 to execute the command in background tmux session. The Gazebo client GUI will show up. Hit Ctrl-F12 to stop the session, killing Gazebo along with all ROS nodes (currently only on ROS1).

Aliases

Complete list of the aliases can be seen in aliases.sh file. Few of them are presented below:

Alias	Expanded command	Description
sc	source_ws $(cat $WS_FILE)	Sources the currently selected workspace.
o	sudo chown -R $USER:$USER	Allows easy ownership change for selected files.
x	chmod +x	Adds execution permissions for desired files.
...	....	.......

Functions

Quick Launch

Function	Description
set-quick-command	Saves the command for further use.
get-quick-command	Loads the command.
print-quick-command	Displays the command.
exec-quick-command	Executes the command in background tmux session.
kill-tmux-quick-command	Ends the execution of the tmux session, along with Gazebo and ALL ROS nodes.
...	....

ROS Workspace

A simple UI for ROS workspace creation and selection is defined in several functions.

Function	Description
select_ws	Shows dialog for WS selections
prompt_new_ws	Shows dialog for new ROS workspace creation (ROS1/ROS2).
rebuild_curr_ws	Rebuilds ROS workspace (ROS1 - catkin/ROS2 - colcon).
...	....

Miscellaneous

Function	Description
RM	Sets ROS_MASTER_URI variable, optionally in local network.
rt	Executes rostopic with grep for desired argument.
fixJB	Updates JetBrains' shortcuts for CLion and PyCharm to be launched within ROS workspace.
unROS	Cleans all ROS-related environment variables.
...	....

Removal

Clear ~/.bashrc file from the added lines. Delete the repo. Voilà!