From: Andrey U. <uj...@cs...> - 2003-12-17 10:21:32
|
Greetings! I'm rather new to player/stage but preliminary examination renders this package as very powerful and promising one. My research group is working in field of Mobile Robot Dynamic Object Mapping/Tracking. Thereby I'd like to pose the following questions: 1. is it possible in player 1.4.2/Stage 1.3.3 to use laser/sonar devices to spot objects other then walls? 2. are there any plans to add Dynamic Object entities with autonomous behaviour into stage? or would it be appropriate to implement such entities by myself? 3. Is it possible to use localization/mapping devices such as amcl (adaptive MonteCarlo Localization) in Stage simulator? 4. are there any plans to implement Kalman-filter-based localization module/device? I appologise for crossposting, but for now I'm not sure which maillist is more suitable for such questions and I'd appreciate any advise greatly. -- Best regards, Andrey |
From: Brian G. <ge...@ro...> - 2003-12-17 17:14:42
|
On Wed, 17 Dec 2003, Andrey Ustujanyn wrote: > I'm rather new to player/stage but preliminary examination renders this > package as very powerful and promising one. > My research group is working in field of Mobile Robot Dynamic Object > Mapping/Tracking. Thereby I'd like to pose the following questions: hi Andrey, > 1. is it possible in player 1.4.2/Stage 1.3.3 to use laser/sonar devices > to spot objects other then walls? Yes. In addition to walls, sonars in Stage will also "spot" (i.e., be reflected by and thus return the range to) any entity with its 'sonar_return' flag set to "visible". Similarly, lasers will also see and return the range to any entity with its 'laser_return' flag set to either "visible" or "bright". For "bright" entities, the laser also returns a high intensity value, to simulate highly reflective objects, such as special retro-reflective tape or corner-cube reflectors. Each entity has default settings for these flags; they can all be changed in your .world file. If you decide to use a laser for spotting objects, a couple of ways to do it (besides plain old scan-differencing) are: make the objects "bright" and then pick them out of the laser scan; or set the 'fiducial_id' of each object, then use a 'fiducialfinder' (attached to the laser) to find the objects. The latter option simulates the situation in which you've attached unique beacons, such as reflective barcodes, to the objects. > 2. are there any plans to add Dynamic Object entities with autonomous > behaviour into stage? or would it be appropriate to implement such > entities by myself? There are no plans to do this, primarily because it can be easily done with the existing tools. For example: for each Dynamic Object, add to your .world file a robot with sonars, then control that robot with a Player client however you like (e.g., wall-following, random wandering). > 3. Is it possible to use localization/mapping devices such as amcl > (adaptive MonteCarlo Localization) in Stage simulator? Yes, but it requires a little more setup. There's an example of doing this in the Player User Manual, in the section on the 'amcl' driver. > 4. are there any plans to implement Kalman-filter-based localization > module/device? Not as far as I know, but it would be most welcome if you were to implement and contribute it.... brian. |
From: Andrey U. <uj...@cs...> - 2003-12-18 09:11:20
|
Hi Brian, Thank you for descriptive answers. Now I'd like to experiment with moving objects of various shapes - not only "squares" or "circles". Is it possible to assign a robot (a moving entity) any shape other than standard ones? For example, described by set of points or by black/white mask/silhouette from a PNM-bitmap file? Brian Gerkey wrote: > On Wed, 17 Dec 2003, Andrey Ustujanyn wrote: > > >>I'm rather new to player/stage but preliminary examination renders this >>package as very powerful and promising one. >>My research group is working in field of Mobile Robot Dynamic Object >>Mapping/Tracking. Thereby I'd like to pose the following questions: > > > hi Andrey, > > >>1. is it possible in player 1.4.2/Stage 1.3.3 to use laser/sonar devices >>to spot objects other then walls? > > > Yes. In addition to walls, sonars in Stage will also "spot" (i.e., > be reflected by and thus return the range to) any entity with its > 'sonar_return' flag set to "visible". Similarly, lasers will also see > and return the range to any entity with its 'laser_return' flag set to > either "visible" or "bright". For "bright" entities, the laser also > returns a high intensity value, to simulate highly reflective objects, > such as special retro-reflective tape or corner-cube reflectors. > > Each entity has default settings for these flags; they can all be changed > in your .world file. > > If you decide to use a laser for spotting objects, a couple of ways to do > it (besides plain old scan-differencing) are: make the objects "bright" > and then pick them out of the laser scan; or set the 'fiducial_id' of > each object, then use a 'fiducialfinder' (attached to the laser) to find > the objects. The latter option simulates the situation in which you've > attached unique beacons, such as reflective barcodes, to the objects. > > >>2. are there any plans to add Dynamic Object entities with autonomous >>behaviour into stage? or would it be appropriate to implement such >>entities by myself? > > > There are no plans to do this, primarily because it can be easily done > with the existing tools. For example: for each Dynamic Object, add to > your .world file a robot with sonars, then control that robot with a Player > client however you like (e.g., wall-following, random wandering). > > >>3. Is it possible to use localization/mapping devices such as amcl >>(adaptive MonteCarlo Localization) in Stage simulator? > > > Yes, but it requires a little more setup. There's an example of doing this > in the Player User Manual, in the section on the 'amcl' driver. > > >>4. are there any plans to implement Kalman-filter-based localization >>module/device? > > > Not as far as I know, but it would be most welcome if you were to implement > and contribute it.... > > brian. > -- Kindest Regards, Andrey Ustyuzhanin |
From: Brian G. <ge...@ro...> - 2003-12-18 16:39:11
|
On Thu, 18 Dec 2003, Andrey Ustyuzhanin wrote: > Thank you for descriptive answers. Now I'd like to experiment with > moving objects of various shapes - not only "squares" or "circles". Is > it possible to assign a robot (a moving entity) any shape other than > standard ones? For example, described by set of points or by black/white > mask/silhouette from a PNM-bitmap file? Nope. To be fast, Stage only does squares and circles. If you need other shapes, you might instead use Gazebo, which is more expressive (and 3-D, which makes much cooler movies). brian. |
From: Andrey U. <uj...@cs...> - 2003-12-18 18:23:10
|
Hi Brian, thank you for your answer. I have installed gazebo. The only obstacle was ODE - it took some time to figure out what kind of package is required in case of "ode/ode.h". (It would be nice if you hyperlink http://playerstage.sourceforge.net/gazebo/gazebo.html to http://sourceforge.net/project/shownotes.php?release_id=184802, since the latter page contains rather importtant info on gazebo installation) So, what can I say? It is really slow. And from my point of view it more suitable for demonstartion purposes rather than to research ones. Nevertheless, it seems to be very flexible regarding obejct geometry. And your advise is highly needed to rethink the situation as a whole. In order to support a limited set (say, about 10) of different shapes (in terms of stage) would it be better to modify stage or is gazebo a better place for such experimental activity? I need the answer from perspective of two aspects: a) future support of the product and b) amount of work needed. Thank you in advance. Brian Gerkey wrote: > On Thu, 18 Dec 2003, Andrey Ustyuzhanin wrote: > > >>Thank you for descriptive answers. Now I'd like to experiment with >>moving objects of various shapes - not only "squares" or "circles". Is >>it possible to assign a robot (a moving entity) any shape other than >>standard ones? For example, described by set of points or by black/white >>mask/silhouette from a PNM-bitmap file? > > > Nope. To be fast, Stage only does squares and circles. If you need other > shapes, you might instead use Gazebo, which is more expressive (and 3-D, > which makes much cooler movies). > > brian. > -- Kindest Regards, Andrey Ustyuzhanin |
From: Brian G. <ge...@ro...> - 2003-12-19 19:27:18
|
On Thu, 18 Dec 2003, Andrey Ustyuzhanin wrote: > In order to support a limited set (say, about 10) of different shapes > (in terms of stage) would it be better to modify stage or is gazebo a > better place for such experimental activity? I need the answer from > perspective of two aspects: a) future support of the product and b) > amount of work needed. hi Andrey, For the time being, my advice would be to work with Gazebo, because Stage has been almost entirely re-written since 1.3.x, so any work put into modifying/enhancing it would almost certainly be lost. When Stage 1.4 comes out (one day...), it may be easier to add new shapes (or maybe it will support them natively). brian. |
From: ahoward <ah...@po...> - 2003-12-22 18:35:21
|
On Thu, 18 Dec 2003, Andrey Ustyuzhanin wrote: > So, what can I say? It is really slow. And from my point of view it more > suitable for demonstartion purposes rather than to research ones. Cant take that one lying down. Gazebo only runs slow if you dont have accelerated OpenGL hardware. Otherwise, Stage and Gazebo are roughly comparable in the < 10 robot range; above that, Stage will win out (Stage scales linearly, Gazebo does not). A. Andrew Howard email: ah...@po... Department of Computer Science http: www-robotics.usc.edu/~ahoward University of Southern California phone: 1 (213) 740 6416 Los Angeles, CA, U.S.A. 90089-0781 fax: 1 (213) 821 5696 << Insert pithy saying here >>> |
From: Andrey U. <uj...@cs...> - 2003-12-26 10:56:38
|
ahoward wrote: > On Thu, 18 Dec 2003, Andrey Ustyuzhanin wrote: > > >>So, what can I say? It is really slow. And from my point of view it more >>suitable for demonstartion purposes rather than to research ones. > > > Cant take that one lying down. > > Gazebo only runs slow if you dont have accelerated OpenGL hardware. > Otherwise, Stage and Gazebo are roughly comparable in the < 10 robot > range; above that, Stage will win out (Stage scales linearly, Gazebo does > not). I'd like to clarify some points regarding speed concerns of these applications. X-window system is rather famous for its ability to run application window on a remote computer while the computation/simulation process is being executed on a server. The nature of stage/gazebo, as I preceive, is also lies in such a distributed manner. In my case I run my desktop PC under Windows environment and robot simulation process is performed on a dedicated linux server. Mostly I do not want to see the pictutre of "real world" the robot runs in - I'm interested in its sensors, but at development stage (when something goes wrong) I'm highly interested in what exact situation the robot is, and I open stage/gazebo display to my PC via network. For X-server software I use X-Win 5.4.1, which is considered as a fastest one available. Nevertheless, in case of window dimensions being greater than 320x200 it takes gazebo/XWin more than a second to redraw the window. In case of stage - 2D graphics runs pretty smooth. > > A. > > > Andrew Howard email: ah...@po... > Department of Computer Science http: www-robotics.usc.edu/~ahoward > University of Southern California phone: 1 (213) 740 6416 > Los Angeles, CA, U.S.A. 90089-0781 fax: 1 (213) 821 5696 > << Insert pithy saying here >>> > > > > > > > > > > > > > -- Kindest Regards, Andrey Ustyuzhanin |
From: ahoward <ah...@po...> - 2003-12-26 17:55:45
|
FWIW, there is also another option: Zbynek Winkler <zw...@ro...> has successfully compiled Gazebo under Cygwin, so you can run it natively on your Windoze machine (I dont know how fast the GL stuff goes in this case). Unfortunately, I dont think anyone has done the same for Player (at least not that they have told us). I'm also toying with the idea of creating a remote GUI for Gazebo that works much like the one in Stage: no fancy 3D graphics, but giving you the ability to drag stuff about in a schematic 2.5D representation of the world. A. On Fri, 26 Dec 2003, Andrey Ustyuzhanin wrote: > > ahoward wrote: > > > On Thu, 18 Dec 2003, Andrey Ustyuzhanin wrote: > > > > > >>So, what can I say? It is really slow. And from my point of view it more > >>suitable for demonstartion purposes rather than to research ones. > > > > > > Cant take that one lying down. > > > > Gazebo only runs slow if you dont have accelerated OpenGL hardware. > > Otherwise, Stage and Gazebo are roughly comparable in the < 10 robot > > range; above that, Stage will win out (Stage scales linearly, Gazebo does > > not). > > I'd like to clarify some points regarding speed concerns of these > applications. > X-window system is rather famous for its ability to run application > window on a remote computer while the computation/simulation process is > being executed on a server. The nature of stage/gazebo, as I preceive, > is also lies in such a distributed manner. In my case I run my desktop > PC under Windows environment and robot simulation process is performed > on a dedicated linux server. Mostly I do not want to see the pictutre of > "real world" the robot runs in - I'm interested in its sensors, but at > development stage (when something goes wrong) I'm highly interested in > what exact situation the robot is, and I open stage/gazebo display to my > PC via network. For X-server software I use X-Win 5.4.1, which is > considered as a fastest one available. Nevertheless, in case of window > dimensions being greater than 320x200 it takes gazebo/XWin more than a > second to redraw the window. In case of stage - 2D graphics runs pretty > smooth. > > > > > A. > > > > > > Andrew Howard email: ah...@po... > > Department of Computer Science http: www-robotics.usc.edu/~ahoward > > University of Southern California phone: 1 (213) 740 6416 > > Los Angeles, CA, U.S.A. 90089-0781 fax: 1 (213) 821 5696 > > << Insert pithy saying here >>> > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > -- > Kindest Regards, > Andrey Ustyuzhanin > > > ------------------------------------------------------- > This SF.net email is sponsored by: IBM Linux Tutorials. > Become an expert in LINUX or just sharpen your skills. Sign up for IBM's > Free Linux Tutorials. Learn everything from the bash shell to sys admin. > Click now! http://ads.osdn.com/?ad_id=1278&alloc_id=3371&op=click > _______________________________________________ > Playerstage-users mailing list > Pla...@li... > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/playerstage-users > Andrew Howard email: ah...@po... Department of Computer Science http: www-robotics.usc.edu/~ahoward University of Southern California phone: 1 (213) 740 6416 Los Angeles, CA, U.S.A. 90089-0781 fax: 1 (213) 821 5696 << Insert pithy saying here >>> |
From: Alex M. <al...@ca...> - 2003-12-17 22:05:18
|
Hi Andrey, We have an implementation of a point-feature-based localization algorithm -- both beacon (known features) and Simultaneous Localization and Mapping (SLAM) versions. The features are artificial -- light reflecting strips, easily picked out from the return of Player laser device using the 'intensity' field. One can of course easily substitute any natural feature extraction algorithm. We've thought about making this module into a player device but have chosen not to, although maybe we should reconsider that. Let me know what specifically you are looking for and we can talk about it offline. Alex ---------------------------------------------------- Alex Makarenko Centre for Autonomous Systems (Australian Centre for Field Robotics) Dept. of Mechanical & Mechatronic Engineering J04 The University of Sydney 2006 NSW, AUSTRALIA al...@ca... (a.m...@ac...) www.acfr.usyd.edu.au +61 (0)2 9351 7154 (tel) +61 (0)2 9351 7474 (fax) > -----Original Message----- > From: pla...@li... > [mailto:pla...@li...] On > Behalf Of Andrey Ustujanyn > Sent: Wednesday, 17 December 2003 9:21 PM > To: pla...@li... > Subject: [Playerstage-users] Newbiew question > > > Greetings! > > I'm rather new to player/stage but preliminary examination > renders this package as very powerful and promising one. > My research group is working in field of Mobile Robot Dynamic > Object Mapping/Tracking. Thereby I'd like to pose the > following questions: > > 1. is it possible in player 1.4.2/Stage 1.3.3 to use > laser/sonar devices to spot objects other then walls? > 2. are there any plans to add Dynamic Object entities with > autonomous behaviour into stage? or would it be appropriate > to implement such entities by myself? > 3. Is it possible to use localization/mapping devices such as > amcl (adaptive MonteCarlo Localization) in Stage simulator? > 4. are there any plans to implement Kalman-filter-based > localization module/device? > > I appologise for crossposting, but for now I'm not sure which > maillist is more suitable for such questions and I'd > appreciate any advise greatly. > > -- > Best regards, > Andrey > > > > ------------------------------------------------------- > This SF.net email is sponsored by: IBM Linux Tutorials. > Become an expert in LINUX or just sharpen your skills. Sign > up for IBM's Free Linux Tutorials. Learn everything from the > bash shell to sys admin. > Click now! http://ads.osdn.com/?ad_id=1278&alloc_id=3371&op=click > _______________________________________________ > Playerstage-users mailing list > Pla...@li... > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/playerstage-users > |