Robot Operating System

Robot Operating System
Original author(s)Willow Garage
Stanford Artificial Intelligence Laboratory
Open Robotics
Initial release2007; 17 years ago (2007)
Stable release
Iron Irwini[1] / 23 May 2023; 16 months ago (2023-05-23)
Preview release
Jazzy Jalisco (ROS 2)[2]
Repositorygithub.com/ros2/ros2
Written inC++, Python, and Lisp
Operating systemLinux, macOS (experimental), Windows 10 (experimental)
TypeRobotics suite, OS, library
LicenseApache 2.0
Websitewww.ros.org
As ofJune 2023

Robot Operating System (ROS or ros) is an open-source robotics middleware suite. Although ROS is not an operating system (OS) but a set of software frameworks for robot software development, it provides services designed for a heterogeneous computer cluster such as hardware abstraction, low-level device control, implementation of commonly used functionality, message-passing between processes, and package management. Running sets of ROS-based processes are represented in a graph architecture where processing takes place in nodes that may receive, post, and multiplex sensor data, control, state, planning, actuator, and other messages. Despite the importance of reactivity and low latency in robot control, ROS is not a real-time operating system (RTOS). However, it is possible to integrate ROS with real-time computing code.[3] The lack of support for real-time systems has been addressed in the creation of ROS 2,[4][5][6] a major revision of the ROS API which will take advantage of modern libraries and technologies for core ROS functions and add support for real-time code and embedded system hardware.

Software in the ROS Ecosystem[7] can be separated into three groups:

  • language- and platform-independent tools used for building and distributing ROS-based software;
  • ROS client library implementations such as roscpp,[8] rospy,[9] and roslisp;[10]
  • packages containing application-related code which uses one or more ROS client libraries.[11]

Both the language-independent tools and the main client libraries (C++, Python, and Lisp) are released under the terms of the BSD license, and as such are open-source software and free for both commercial and research use. The majority of other packages are licensed under a variety of open-source licenses. These other packages implement commonly used functionality and applications such as hardware drivers, robot models, datatypes, planning, perception, simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM), simulation tools, and other algorithms.

The main ROS client libraries are geared toward a Unix-like system, mostly because of their dependence on large sets of open-source software dependencies. For these client libraries, Ubuntu Linux is listed as "Supported" while other variants such as Fedora Linux, macOS, and Microsoft Windows are designated "experimental" and are supported by the community.[12] The native Java ROS client library, rosjava,[13] however, does not share these limitations and has enabled ROS-based software to be written for the Android OS.[14] rosjava has also enabled ROS to be integrated into an officially supported MATLAB toolbox which can be used on Linux, macOS, and Microsoft Windows.[15] A JavaScript client library, roslibjs[16] has also been developed which enables integration of software into a ROS system via any standards-compliant web browser.

  1. ^ "ROS 2 Iron Irwini". ROS.org. Open Robotics. Retrieved 4 June 2023.
  2. ^ "ROS 2 Jazzy Jalisco". ROS.org. Open Robotics. May 2024. Retrieved 4 June 2023.
  3. ^ "ROS/Introduction – ROS Wiki". ROS.org. Open Robotics. Retrieved 30 July 2021.
  4. ^ Kay, Jackie (January 2016). "Proposal for Implementation of Real-time Systems in ROS 2". ROS.org. Open Robotics. Retrieved 23 January 2023.
  5. ^ Kay, Jackie (January 2016). "Realtime Design Guidelines For ROS 2". ROS.org. Open Robotics. Retrieved 23 January 2023.
  6. ^ "ROS 2 For Realtime Applications". ROS.org. Open Robotics. 17 October 2018. Retrieved 22 November 2018.
  7. ^ "Browsing packages for melodic". ROS.org. Open Robotics. Archived from the original on 24 September 2015. Retrieved 21 February 2016.
  8. ^ "Package Summary". ROS.org. Open Robotics. Retrieved 21 February 2016.
  9. ^ "Package SUmmary". ROS.org. Open Robotics. Retrieved 21 February 2016.
  10. ^ "Package Summary". ROS.org. Open Robotics. Retrieved 21 February 2016.
  11. ^ "client libraries". ROS.org. Open Robotics. Retrieved 12 December 2017.
  12. ^ "ROS/Installation – ROS Wiki". ROS.org. Open Robotics. 29 September 2013. Retrieved 12 July 2014.
  13. ^ "rosjava – ROS Wiki". ROS.org. Open Robotics. Retrieved 29 April 2019.
  14. ^ "android – ROS Wiki". ROS.org. Open Robotics. 12 April 2014. Retrieved 12 July 2014.
  15. ^ "Robot Operating System (ROS) Support from MATLAB – Hardware Support". Mathworks.com. Retrieved 12 July 2014.
  16. ^ "roslibjs – ROS Wiki". ROS.org. Open Robotics. Retrieved 29 April 2019.