Working with the Ouster OS1

Documentation

Detailed information about the ouster-ros package can be found on Github.

Configuration

The ouster has to be connected to the jetson board via the usb-ethernet connector. The resulting ethernet connection (eth1[00:3B:A3:00:6E]) has to be set to Link-Local Only (IPv4).

The Ouster LiDAR can either be connected to the robot or to a personal laptop for testing. The Ouster package offers .launch files for running the node, recording from the sensor to a .bag file and replaying from a .bag file.

Run

To launch all required OS1 ROS-nodes, the sensor.launch file can be launched by providing it the sensor_hostname, which consists of os-<SERIAL_NUMBER>.local

roslaunch ouster_ros sensor.launch sensor_hostname:=os-122222003163.local viz:=false

• sensor_hostname configures the node to the hardware

• viz:=false prevents the launch file from launching rviz on the robot

Extract metadata

The recording of rosbags requires metadata about the sensor configuration. These can be extracted with the service /ouster/get_config which outputs the current metadata to the console. This string can then be saved to the metadata.json file.

Record

The launch file for recording to rosbags requires both a absolute path to the metadata.json file and a absolute path to the generated *.bag file.

Local:

roslaunch ouster_ros record.launch sensor_hostname:=os-122222003163.local metadata:=/home/juri/ROSWorkspace/BA/src/ouster-ros/config/metadata.json bag_file:=/home/juri/ROSWorkspace/BA/bags/os1_test.bag

Change the metadata.json and the os1_test.bag file accordingly.

On robot:

roslaunch ouster_ros record.launch sensor_hostname:=os-122222003163.local metadata:=/home/unitree/catkin_ws/src/ouster-ros/config/metadata.json bag_file:=/home/unitree/catkin_ws/bags/os1_test.bag viz:=false

Change the metadata.json and the os1_test.bag file accordingly.

Note the change in path to /home/unitree/catkin_ws instead of home/juri/ROSWorkspace and the flag viz:=false

Replay .bag recording

The mode to replay rosbags requires both the absolute path to the metadata.json and *.bag files. Since the replay is independent of live lidar measurements, the sensor_hostname doesn’t have to provided.

Local:

roslaunch ouster_ros replay.launch metadata:=/home/juri/ROSWorkspace/BA/src/ouster-ros/config/metadata.json bag_file:=/home/juri/ROSWorkspace/BA/bags/os1_test.bag

Change the metadata.json and the os1_test.bag file accordingly.

On robot:

roslaunch ouster_ros replay.launch metadata:=/home/unitree/catkin_ws/src/ouster-ros/config/metadata.json bag_file:=/home/unitree/catkin_ws/bags/os1_test.bag viz:=false

Change the metadata.json and the os1_test.bag file accordingly.

Note the change in path to /home/unitree/catkin_ws instead of home/juri/ROSWorkspace and the flag viz:=false