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Quickstart Guide

Installing the Virtual Machine

The available VM has been tested both on a Windows 11 Intel PC and a MacOS 13.4 Intel Mac. For Silicon M1/M2 Macs, the VirtualBox is only available as a developers preview and therefore considered experimental.
  1. 1.
    ​Download and install VirtualBox and the extension Pack.
  2. 2.
    To improve the
  3. 3.
    ​Download and import the .ova VM in VirtualBox.
  4. 4.
    In theory, the network settings should be configured correctly. To check them, open the settings and make sure the network adapters are configured as follows:
Adapter for WiFi
Adapter for Unitree hotspot
Adapter for Ouster LiDAR
  1. 4.
    Additionally, you can configure the system settings to utilize all cores and RAM in the system settings.
  2. 5.
    To make use of the shared folder, update the shared folders settings to a existing folder.
  1. 6.
    Start the VM and log in with the password RoboDog3.

Creating the ROS Folder Structure

  1. 1.
    If you're using the VM from above, the rbd_packages folder is already available in the ~/git/ folder and symbolically linked to the catkin workspace ~/ROSWorkspaces/BA/src/.
  2. 2.
    To execute the ROS commands, change to the catkin workspace with cd ~/ROSWorkspaces/BA.

Starting from Scratch

  1. 1.
    First, clone the GitHub repo with git clone https://github.com/juripfammatter/rbd_package.
  2. 2.
    ​Create a workspace folder (assuming you've installed ROS Melodic):
    1
    source /opt/ros/melodic/setup.bash
    2
    cd
    3
    mkdir ROSWorkspaces/BA/src
    4
    cd ~/ROSWorkspaces/BA
    5
    catkin init
    6
    catkin build
    7
    source devel/setup.bash
  3. 3.
    Link the rbd_packages folder symbolically to the new catkin workspace: ln -s ~/git/rbd_packages/rbd_ros_local ~/ROSWorkspaces/BA/src.
  4. 4.
    Build the packages with catkin build.
  5. 5.
    source devel/setup.bash.

Mounting Hardware

  1. 1.
    Mount the camera mount to the ZED2 Stereo camera.
  2. 2.
    Mount the camera with the camera mount to the robot.
  3. 3.
    Insert two M3 screws diagonally into the LiDAR mount.
  4. 4.
    Connect the power cable to the 19 V output and the LiDAR's USB-cable to the robot.
  5. 5.
    Mount the LiDAR mount onto the robot.
  6. 6.
    Connect the ZED2 camera via its USB-cable.

Starting the Robot

  1. 1.
    Check the battery status by pressing the power button located on the battery on the left-hand side once.
  2. 2.
    Start the robot by pressing the power button once and then holding it until the LEDs begin to move.
  3. 3.
    After a few seconds connect your local machine to the Unitree's WiFi hotspot.
  4. 4.
    Unplug the USB-cable of the LiDAR for one second, then plug it back in.
  5. 5.
    Check the connection to the robot with ping [email protected].
  6. 6.
    Start the whole system by running ./rbd_startup.sh in your home directory.
  7. 7.
    Now the GUI, camera image and Rviz should open a window on your local machine.
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Last modified 3mo ago