Setup ROS 2

We will install and set up system environment of ROS 2 on both Raspberry Pi and a host computer.

Operating System (OS)

According to the REP-2000 list, Ubuntu 24.04 and Windows 10 are both tier 1 supported OS by ROS 2 Jazzy, and MacOS is on the tier 3 list. This means you can pretty much install ROS 2 on any OS. But installing Ubuntu on Raspberry Pi is way easier. Interested readers can follow the official guides to: - install ROS 2 on Windows - build ROS 2 from source on MacOS - or simply run ROS 2 in dockers.

1. Installation

Please refer to the official guide to install ROS 2 with Ubuntu deb packages.

Version Binding

If this is your first time, please strictly bind the ROS 2 version: Jazzy with Ubuntu version: 24.04.

We have summarized all the shell commands from the official guide as below. Copy and paste them to your terminal window to install ROS 2

# Set locale
sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade -y
sudo apt install locales
sudo locale-gen en_US en_US.UTF-8
sudo update-locale LC_ALL=en_US.UTF-8 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
export LANG=en_US.UTF-8

# Enable required repositories
sudo apt install software-properties-common -y
sudo add-apt-repository universe

sudo apt update && sudo apt install curl -y
export ROS_APT_SOURCE_VERSION=$(curl -s https://api.github.com/repos/ros-infrastructure/ros-apt-source/releases/latest | grep -F "tag_name" | awk -F\" '{print $4}')
curl -L -o /tmp/ros2-apt-source.deb "https://github.com/ros-infrastructure/ros-apt-source/releases/download/${ROS_APT_SOURCE_VERSION}/ros2-apt-source_${ROS_APT_SOURCE_VERSION}.$(. /etc/os-release && echo ${UBUNTU_CODENAME:-${VERSION_CODENAME}})_all.deb"
sudo dpkg -i /tmp/ros2-apt-source.deb

# Install development tools
sudo apt update && sudo apt install ros-dev-tools -y

# Install ROS 2
sudo apt install -y ros-jazzy-desktop ros-jazzy-rmw-cyclonedds-cpp

Verify ROS 2 Installation

This step verifies if ROS 2's communication, C++ and Python API are working correctly.

Tip

This is exactly the same as the Try some examples section in the official installation guide.

In one terminal, source the setup file and then run a C++ talker:

source /opt/ros/jazzy/setup.bash
ros2 run demo_nodes_cpp talker

In another terminal source the setup file and then run a Python listener:

source /opt/ros/jazzy/setup.bash
ros2 run demo_nodes_py listener

Tip

Hold Ctrl then press c on the keyboard will terminate the executing program.

2. ROS 2 Environment Setup

Edit $HOME/.bashrc file and add following to (the bottom of) the file.

source /opt/ros/jazzy/setup.bash  # activate ros2
export ROS_DOMAIN_ID=123  # same on all devices, 0~232
export RMW_IMPLEMENTATION=rmw_cyclonedds_cpp  # use cyclonedds
source /usr/share/colcon_argcomplete/hook/colcon-argcomplete.bash  # autocomplete colcon commands
export _colcon_cd_root=/opt/ros/jazzy/  # specify ros2 root dir

User Configuration Script

In Ubuntu (and many Linux distros), a shell configuration file is saved at $HOME/.bashrc. The commands stored in this file will be executed every time the user started a terminal session.

Quick Explanation

source /opt/ros/jazzy/setup.bash will automatically activate ros2 command.

Or, we need to manually activate it every time a new terminal started, which is very inconvenient.
export ROS_DOMAIN_ID=<id_number> designates a ROS domain ID number for the current device. To ensure nodes running on different devices can communicate with each other, all the devices should set ROS domain IDs to this number. The <id_number> should be within the range between 0 to 232. For more details, please read the official guide about domain ID.
export RMW_IMPLEMENTATION=rmw_cyclonedds_cpp will change Data Distribution System (DDS) of ROS 2 to Eclipse CycloneDDS. ROS 2 is using DDS for communication management. The default FastDDS is OK, but may not the ideal one for the navigation.
colcon is a command line tool to improve the workflow of building, testing and using multiple software packages. source /usr/share/colcon_argcomplete/hook/colcon-argcomplete.bash will enable CLI using autocompletion of colcon.
We can quickly navigate around ROS 2 packages using the colcon_cd command. export _colcon_cd_root=/opt/ros/jazzy/ will designate root directory of all ROS 2 packages to `/opt/ros/jazzy/.