AlterEgo-Base and Full robot Simulator

This Repo contains the AlterEgo ROS-package for both alterego small and tall.

The following work has been tested on March 14th 2024 on Ubuntu 20.04 with ROS-Noetic. You will find the relative GUI repository in the vision branch.

Build and test

First installation

For semplicity we have adopted a ROBOT_NAME environment variable as namespace for all the robot that we have produced.

So, you need to source in every terminal the following line

export ROBOT_NAME=robot_alterego_sim

Otherwise you can also add it into the .bashrc

Add the submodules

cd AlterEGO
git submodule init
git submodule update

Install and Build the RBDL

if not previously installed then:

cd ~/(your_catkin_path)/src/AlterEgo_vs/utils/rbdl
mkdir build
cd build
cmake -D CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release -D RBDL_BUILD_ADDON_URDFREADER=ON -D RBDL_USE_ROS_URDF_LIBRARY=OFF ../
make
sudo make install

Install dependencies

sudo apt install ros-noetic-realsense2-camera
sudo apt install ros-noetic-realsense2-description
sudo apt-get install ros-noetic-move-base
sudo apt-get install ros-noetic-amcl
sudo apt-get install ros-noetic-ddynamic-reconfigure
sudo apt-get install ros-noetic-rplidar-ros
sudo apt-get install ros-noetic-pointcloud-to-laserscan
sudo apt-get install ros-noetic-octomap-server
sudo apt-get install ros-noetic-ira-laser-tools

Install dependencies for realsense

:https://dev.intelrealsense.com/docs/compiling-librealsense-for-linux-ubuntu-guide

Create conda env

These four commands download the latest 64-bit version of the Linux installer, rename it to a shorter file name, silently install, and then delete the installer:

mkdir -p ~/miniconda3
wget https://repo.anaconda.com/miniconda/Miniconda3-latest-Linux-x86_64.sh -O ~/miniconda3/miniconda.sh
bash ~/miniconda3/miniconda.sh -b -u -p ~/miniconda3
rm ~/miniconda3/miniconda.sh

After installing, close and reopen your terminal application or refresh it by running the following command:

source ~/miniconda3/bin/activate

To initialize conda on all available shells, run the following command:

conda init --all

Then deactivate the autostart activation of the base env

conda config --set auto_activate_base false

Face Recognition and Tracking

If you want to use the face tracking and recognition, lets create the virtual env from the bash file create_env.sh inside

cd ~/(your_catkin_path)/src/AlterEgo_v2/alterego_control/alterego_face_recognition 
./create_env.sh
cd ~/(your_catkin_path)
catkin build alterego_face_recognition alterego_face_tracking

Build the entire solution

Move to source dir cd ~/(your_catkin_path)/. Then

catkin build

Run the simulation

Display the simulator with gazebo and rviz

#Change the version if you want to display the version 2(small), 3(tall) or 4(small with kickstand)
roslaunch alterego_gazebo main.launch version:=2

SLAM

Test slam with realsense lidar:

roslaunch alterego_navigation create_map.launch

Move the robot with the keyboard for creating a good map:

roslaunch alterego_teleop_keyboard teleop.launch

Save the generated map

#REMEMBER TO CHANGE "robot_alterego3" with the namespace of the computer
rosrun map_server map_saver -f office map:=/(your name_space pc)/map

Close the node

Planning and obstacle avoidance

Move the robot with move base and the ted local planner:

roslaunch alterego_navigation autonomous_nav.launch

or add param nav = true to main.launch

roslaunch alterego_gazebo main.launch version:=3 nav:=true

Info on how to setup the virtual cam in simulation

With the ros-virtual-cam we can simulate the camera plugin as a dev/ttyUSB device and send the stream via UDP and use the pilot oculus framework also in simulation

https://github.com/jgoppert/ros-virtual-cam

Move IT

Download moveit in ROS Run the demo.launch

Miantainers

👨 Giovanni Rosato
      Email: [email protected]
      GitHub: @GianniRos
      Linkedin: @giovanni-rosato-linkedin

👨 Eleonora Sguerri
      Email: [email protected]
      GitHub: @EleSgu
      Linkedin: @eleonora-sguerri-linkedin