ROS2 transition - MRS UAV System diagram

Third-party package refactoring decision making tree

MRS UAV Core

MRS UAV Modules

Sensor drivers

Robofly

Gazebo + PX4 SITL

New features - not in ROS1 MRS yet

MRS Course tasks (for 2026)

Octomap mapping & planning

UVDAR

Documentation

Buildfarm

OpenVINS Core

Core example packages

PX4 + Mavros

PointLIO Core

Precise Landing

LIOSAM Core

ALOAM Core

MINS Core

Hector Core

Computer vision examples

Summer School task (for 2026)

Flight Forge

MRS Docker

MRS Apptainer

Portainer system

Task 03 swarm

Task 01 controller

Task 02 formation

Months-worth of work (1 Tomas)

Weeks-woth of work (1 Tomas)

Days-worth of work (1 Tomas)

Unreal sim package

Simulator node
HW APi
rename package
dynparam mgr

Basic functionality works

ROS2 bridge (Hugues)

Is it alive? Can it be used by people who want to run their ROS1 node agains the ROS2 system?
investigate

Controller and Tracker Timeouting

MRS UAV testing

the abstraction library
tests
- example tests using the lib

HW Api

plugin interface
example plugin
plugin manager
doxygen

Dynmgr

TODO callbacks
TODO ranges

Parakh's propulsion model

Remote controller HW abstracton

UTM zone handling

Diagnostics manager?

talk to Vojta and get an idea how it works
Maybe Matous should do it?

Safety area manager

refactor
incorporate
tests

MRS Errorgraph viewer

refactor
incorporate

ROS2 inter-robot communication

How to correctly configure remote access to remote ROS2 machine?
How to replace the old Nimbro setup with native ROS2 features

RMW Zenoh

will it be better than FastDDS?
can it replace nimbro?
- can it be configured per-topic?
does it perform with fast and large msgs?

ROS2 problems and regressions

Martin Pecka's notes: https://gist.github.com/peci1/52aea17faf5f7e33c8096b75dc9bcd2f

TUI

no roscd
calling services got complicated (filling json dictionaries by hand sucks)
no colors without exporting a variable (export RCUTILS_COLORIZED_OUTPUT=1)
no code completion without modifying the environment

eval "$(/usr/bin/register-python-argcomplete ros2)"
eval "$(/usr/bin/register-python-argcomplete colcon)"

when switching RMW, the ROS daemon needs to be killed (pkill -9 -f ros && ros2 daemon stop)
code completion suggest only the launch files that end with .launch.py

colcon

no colors
no build-in profiles (mixin exists, but they need to be setup, are stored externally in a file)
colcon build makes new workspace if not called in the root of the workspace
including headers does not prioritize the ones in the workspace (https://colcon.readthedocs.io/en/released/user/overriding-packages.html#sort-include-directories-according-to-the-workspace-order)
no direct control of the number of build threads without exporting an environment variable (export MAKEFLAGS=-j3)

Launch

respawning does not work
not crashing in the launch file will not cause the launch file to crash
launch files need to be "grouped" while being included, otherwise the arguments are going to be overlapping
when node is started using ros2 launch, it does not have direct access to TTY, which make using libraries such as ncurses impossible
launch files can not be launched using a relative path, they need to be part of a package installed in the install space

Containers

The container some times exists with nonzero exit code, nothing found in backtrace. This often happens during sig-terming the node, so checking the return code in the integration tests is not viable.
The component can not be killed "nicely" from within itself

FastRTPS

Causes the node to freeze (slow down significantly) when service being called from another computer

Zenoh

When the router dies before other nodes (e.g., when stopping an integration test), the other nodes crash
bug with data leakage, should be fixed with the release of rmw_zenoh=0.2.8.

Parameters

All parameters are shown in rqt_reconfigure and can not be removed, only "greyed out"
All components are getting the callback for changing parameters, even for other component's parameters
Missing dynamic parameter grouping from rqt_reconfigure
Missing enums from dynamic parameters
Cryptic error when loading an empty config file
rqt_reconfigure does not show any params for the node if there is a param without a value
if you set parameter range to, e.g., <0, 100>, it will let through -inf and inf :-D (https://github.com/ros2/rclcpp/issues/2898)
Loading of "optional" parameters is broken: They can not be undeclared (https://answers.ros.org/question/395760/) if they were not loaded. This then brakes rqt_reconfigure.

rclcpp

the generic topic subscriber now needs to know the topic type in runtime
the official Timer implementation is very CPU heavy (5x over ROS1, 4x over custom threaded implementation)
comparing incompatible times will throw an exception! this is easy to miss or cause during runtime. Why is C++ library for realtime robotics throwing so many exceptions?
service call is by default async, the sync one needs to be implemented manually; the boiler plate code for both is pretty large
cannot change period of ROS Timers when they already exist
the need to implement your own "onInit()" using a thread or a Timer
- update! can be solved elegantly by having the node as a member variable of a "Wrapper", e.g., mrs_lib::Node.

rclpy

filling Int type into a Double type of a ROS message will cause runtime error
no AnyMessage subscriber, you need to know the type when subscribing

Pluginlib

Does not kill the plugins nicely when exiting
- You need to implement a shutdown callback in the parent node and reset the plugin's pointers by hand

rosbag

rosbag play does not show the progress anymore

Documentation

https://docs.ros.org/en/jazzy/Concepts/Intermediate/About-Domain-ID.html
- nice philosofical info about the Domain ID, but ... how do you set it? There is no practical example. Is it an env variable? Is it and argument for the node? Who know?

Rviz

Not able to visualize compressed images in Jazzy

Image Transport

python implementation missing on Jazzy

MRS Errorgraph

refactor
incorporate

Signed disarming

mrs_msgs

refactor
building of doxygen docs

F4F utilizes and deploys these features in an industrial setting

F4F

External dependencies

ROS
Eigen

Object tracking example

refactor

Libcamera ROS driver

there should be official ROS2 branch
rafactor

Hailo AI adapter

refactor
update base image builder

Libcamera driver library

refactor (probably stays the same)

Bluefox driver (2 weeks)

does it have a newer ROS2 branch?
refactor

F4F software installation guide

update

F4F documentation

update

ICM IMU driver

refactor

START

Basic robofly example

basic example

Portainer stacks

refactor

Landing estimator

refactor

Realsense driver (1 week)

does it have a newer ROS2 branch?
refactor

Camera base

does it have an equivalent in ROS2
refactor (incoroporated into Bluefox2)

F4F

Basler driver

does it have a newer ROS2 branch?
beware the multithreading problem
refactor

Ouster driver

does it have a newer ROS2 branch?
refactor
TODOs after the camp

Observations

Pixhawk 6x with GPS (but fying with VIO)

missing mavros/local_position/odom which is a source for hw_api/velocity

Pixhawk 4 with GPS

missing mavros/odometry/in which is a source for hw_api/orientation

Livox360 driver

does it have a newer ROS2 branch?
refactor

Luxonis driver

fork or wrap
fixed launch files

RPLidar driver

does it have a newer ROS2 branch?
are we using it?
refactor

April tag detector

find and adapt ROS2 version

F4F

Gazebo simulation package

refactor

Landing controller

refactor

refactor ROS bindings and integration
udpate examples

F4F

refactor ROS bindings and integration
udpate examples

CI Scripts

set of common scripts used by the buildfarm and by separate repositories' actions
update and refactor

F4F

MRS Docs

updating prerequisities about ROS
refactoring all example pages
refactoring pieces of ROS1-related code snippets

Cheatsheet

Update ROS-related stuff

Main github page

update when ready

MRS Internal wiki

update

Replace it with something better

Is there a ROS2 branch?

open_mins

refactor

mrs_mins_estimator_plugin

refactor

Do we have our own changes to the ROS1 branch

Refactor to ROS2 ourselves

Let's refactor the ROS1 version into ROS2 ourselves

Let's adopt the ROS2 version and update it with our changes

Let's refactor the ROS1 version into ROS2 ourselves

Summer school real-world deployment

update and refactor

Summer school simulation and wrappers

update and refactor

Test the ROS2 branch as it is

Check if the ROS2 branch needs the changes as well

Does it perform well?

Do we need the changes?

Is it better to merge them into the ROS2 version?

Decide if we should fix the ROS2 branch or to port the ROS1 (that worked) to ROS2

Let's adopt the ROS2 branch

Well then?

Let's adopt the ROS2 branch and fix it's problems

mrs_aloam_core

refactor

remove Gazebo
update and refactor

build from scratch without the MRS UAV System with just the Multirotor Sim lib

remove Gazebo
update and refactor

START

Do we want to keep the software?

mrs_point_lio_core

refactor

mrs_aloam_estimator_plugin

refactor

mrs_open_vins_estimator_plugin

refactor

tested in simulation
tested in realworld

mrs_vins_imu_filter

refactor

open_vins

refactor

mrs_open_vins_core

refactor

mrs_vins_republisher

refactor

mrs_liosam_estimator_plugin

refactor

liosam

refactor

mrs_liosam_core

refactor

aloam_slam

refactor

mrs_aloam_core

refactor

MRS UAV Modules metapackage

refactor

point_lio

refactor

mrs_point_lio_estimator_plugin

refactor

mrs_hector_core

refactor

mrs_hector_estimator_plugin

refactor

hector_slam

refactor

MRS Serial

refactor
important for RTK

MRS Bumper

refactor

Hector + core

does it have a newer ROS2 branch?
is anybody using it?

refactor

MINS + core

does it have a newer ROS2 branch?

refactor

MRS PCL Tools

refactor
depends on Ouster, should we rethink this?

livox_ros_driver2

refactor

Path loader

refactor

Trajectory loader

refactor

MRS Rviz plugins (Afzal)

not essential, should be possible
refactor

Optic flow

refactor if yes

MRS LLCP (Richard)

refactor

LIOSAM + core

does it have a newer ROS2 branch?

refactor

POINT LIO + core

does it have a newer ROS2 branch?

refactor

F4F

MRS Utils

refactor

Gazebo custom drone example

refactor

PX4 SITL

updgrade to the newest reasonable PX4 version -> 1.16.0

Drone spawner

keep the functionalities
dockerization?

Gazebo

refactor the metapackage
- launch files
- configs

ALOAM + core

does it have a newer ROS2 branch?

refactor

OpenVins + Core

does it have a newer ROS2 branch?

refactor

MRS Modules msgs

refactor
building of doxygen docs

F4F

Gazebo common & extra resources

custom plugins
custom worlds
tf publishing

UVDAR Gazebo plugin

Refactor

Sensor drivers (px4_sitl_gazebo)

custom motor plugin
our custom fixes to the magnetometer (did not use inclination)
custom fixes to lidar
custom fixes to GPS plugin

Robofly's UVDAR

rafactor

UVDAR calibration routine

Refactor

UVDAR Core

Refactor

Who is going to do it?
Are there any dependencies to real sensor drivers?

F4F

ROS Kalibr docker

Question: does Kalibr have a ROS2 version (it needs rosbag as an input)
Answer: No, it is not developed anymore. There might be activities related to disentangling it from ROS completely (https://github.com/ethz-asl/kalibr/issues/725).
refactor
or make sure rosbags can be converted from ROS2 to ROS1

Stacks

refactor/create example stacks

MRS UAV System metarepositories

refactor

MRS UAV Bluetotth

refactor

MRS UAV USB Configurator

refactor

MRS UAV Gazebo testing

refactor

CPP

edge detector

Python

blob detector
- with venv

Mavros

Mavros works

Octomap server (Valentin)

refactor
merge changes from SPRIND

Octomap planner

refactor
merge changes from SPRIND

Python

sweeping generator

SubT Planning lib

refactor
might not contain ROS

F4F

MRS Coppelia simulation

I would keep it as an example
refactor

MRS UAV Deployment

the package builds
refactor config files
example realworld tmux sessions

PX4 Hw API

Refactor
Test with a real drone first (if the comunications work as expected)

MRS Octomap Tools

refactor
is it used?

MRS DJI Tello API

refactor

MRS UAV Shell Additions

refactor

Rosbag Record

how do our customizations from ROS1 apply?
- rosbag record is killed when it cannot write to the disk anymore
- it publishes and prints the data rate
- investigate and implement
converting bags from ROS2 to ROS1 (for kalibr)
converting bags from ROS1 to ROS2 (for datasets)

Trajectory generation

Refactor
Tests
path random flier

MRS UAV Autostart

Refactor
Tests

NLOPT solver ROS wrapper

refactor

MRS UAV Status

Acquisition node
Presentation node

Is FastRTSP good enough for images and pointclouds? (deleg. Tsoy Artyom)

not as bad as initially thought
try the Zenoh RMW, which should work like the ROS1 with roscore
FastRTSP is unusable for real-time performance reasons

MRS UAV Development

colon alias for ease of use
custom roscd alias
pre-sourcing of a selected workspace for speedup of the process

mrs_uav_core package

get_public_params.py
core lauch
rviz refactor script

Colcon workspace

how does the mixin feature work

Pages to fact-check

ROS2 Gazebo

https://ctu-mrs.github.io/docs/simulations/gazebo/custom_world (don't know if the mrs_gazebo_static_transform_republisher plugin is still needed

https://ctu-mrs.github.io/docs/simulations/gazebo/drone_spawner (PX4 firmware and mavros details for the current ros2 setup)

https://ctu-mrs.github.io/docs/simulations/gazebo/gazebo_video (where to get the static_camera from, are the commands best practices)

https://ctu-mrs.github.io/docs/simulations/gazebo/real_world_elevation (where to get sun model from? and new .glb file format)

ROS2 problems and regressions

TUI

colcon

Launch

Containers

FastRTPS

Zenoh

Parameters

rclcpp

rclpy

Pluginlib

rosbag

Documentation

Rviz

Image Transport

F4F utilizes and deploys these features in an industrial setting

F4F

START

F4F

Observations

Pixhawk 6x with GPS (but fying with VIO)

Pixhawk 4 with GPS

F4F

F4F

F4F

CI Scripts

Buildfarm

F4F

F4F

MRS Docs

Cheatsheet

Main github page

MRS Internal wiki

Replace it with something better

Is there a ROS2 branch?

Do we have our own changes to the ROS1 branch

Refactor to ROS2 ourselves

Let's refactor the ROS1 version into ROS2 ourselves

Let's adopt the ROS2 version and update it with our changes

Let's refactor the ROS1 version into ROS2 ourselves

Test the ROS2 branch as it is

Check if the ROS2 branch needs the changes as well

Does it perform well?

Do we need the changes?

Is it better to merge them into the ROS2 version?

Decide if we should fix the ROS2 branch or to port the ROS1 (that worked) to ROS2

Let's adopt the ROS2 branch

Well then?

Let's adopt the ROS2 branch and fix it's problems

START

Do we want to keep the software?

F4F

F4F

F4F

F4F

F4F

TODOs

Minor TODO

makeprg compilation of a package in neovim

Key-signed disarming

Controller and Tracker timeouting

Proper handling of UTM zones

Landing detection for all output modalities

PCL specialization of mrs_lib (Transformer)

Speed tracker (Rethink and refactor?)

MRS UAV Status

MRS Multirotor simulator plugin API

MidAir activation

Launch file

Remote controller abstraction

Ouster driver

PX4 API

ControlManager diagnostics

Basic tests sometimes produce segfaults

[Docu] State machine diagrams of internal processes

Incorporate Yaml remapper from Jakub

We are not using Service Server Handler, why?

Explicitly set callback groups

MRS package version printed during system startup

Luxonis's depth-AI ROS