*tap* *tap* Is this thing on?

[Matthew Miller]

Hi, possible Robotics SIG folks!

I know a lot of the base packages in https://labs.fedoraproject.org/en/robotics/ are still being maintained and updated, but I'm curious about the future of the Suite itself.

I've gotten some pings recently about ROS (https://www.ros.org/), and wonder if any of the folks here (if anyone is still around) has any interest.

I'm also curious if Robotics Suite still makes sense as a spin, or if might be better as a set of containers and use case for Fedora IoT.

If anyone's still around, I'd love your thoughts!

[Ankur Sinha]

On Mon, Nov 22, 2021 18:14:39 -0000, Matthew Miller wrote:
> Hi, possible Robotics SIG folks!

Hiya,
> I know a lot of the base packages in
> https://labs.fedoraproject.org/en/robotics/ are still being maintained
> and updated, but I'm curious about the future of the Suite itself.
>
> I've gotten some pings recently about ROS (https://www.ros.org/), and
> wonder if any of the folks here (if anyone is still around) has any
> interest.

I think the packages are all being maintained (even though I've not
actively been helping recently):

https://src.fedoraproject.org/group/robotics-sig

If you're asking about the full ROS stack, that's historically been very
difficult to package. So we have stuck to providing the base packages
required to install everything else. Not sure if that's changed.
> I'm also curious if Robotics Suite still makes sense as a spin, or if
> might be better as a set of containers and use case for Fedora IoT.

Not sure about any of this I'm afraid. I know folks still use ROS on
workstations/laptops in research. I haven't seen people use it with
containers/IoT etc. in the labs I know yet.

[Till Hofmann]

Hi Matthew,

Regarding ROS: I've been packaging ROS in a COPR for a quite a while 
(since 2017):

https://github.com/morxa/rosfed
https://copr.fedorainfracloud.org/coprs/thofmann/ros/

I have also started looking into getting ROS into Fedora proper, but 
never bothered to actually finish this. See for example
https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/[e-mail]/...

Not sure how much time I could delegate for this, but I'd definitely be 
open for discussions.

Regarding the Robotics Suite, I don't have strong opinions, as I haven't 
used the spin.

Kind regards,
Till

On 11/22/21 19:14, Matthew Miller wrote:
> Hi, possible Robotics SIG folks!
>
> I know a lot of the base packages in https://labs.fedoraproject.org/en/robotics/ are still being maintained and updated, but I'm curious about the future of the Suite itself.
>
> I've gotten some pings recently about ROS (https://www.ros.org/), and wonder if any of the folks here (if anyone is still around) has any interest.
>
> I'm also curious if Robotics Suite still makes sense as a spin, or if might be better as a set of containers and use case for Fedora IoT.
>
> If anyone's still around, I'd love your thoughts!
> _______________________________________________
> robotics mailing list -- [e-mail]
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[Matthew Miller]

On Mon, Nov 22, 2021 at 07:45:31PM +0000, Till Hofmann wrote:
> Hi Matthew,
> Regarding ROS: I've been packaging ROS in a COPR for a quite a while
> (since 2017):
>
> https://github.com/morxa/rosfed
> https://copr.fedorainfracloud.org/coprs/thofmann/ros/

Oh, cool! I notice ROS has three "streams" -- Rolling, "Latest", and LTS.
Which do you follow?
> I have also started looking into getting ROS into Fedora proper, but
> never bothered to actually finish this. See for example
> https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/[e-mail]/...
> Not sure how much time I could delegate for this, but I'd definitely
> be open for discussions.

I'm hoping we can find enough people with current interest that many hands
make the work light. :)
> Regarding the Robotics Suite, I don't have strong opinions, as I
> haven't used the spin.

Thanks!

[Matthew Miller]

On Mon, Nov 22, 2021 at 07:45:31PM +0000, Till Hofmann wrote:
> Regarding ROS: I've been packaging ROS in a COPR for a quite a while
> (since 2017):
>
> https://github.com/morxa/rosfed
> https://copr.fedorainfracloud.org/coprs/thofmann/ros/

Quick question -- this is "original" ROS, not ROS 2, right?

[Till Hofmann]

On 11/24/21 16:34, Matthew Miller wrote:
> On Mon, Nov 22, 2021 at 07:45:31PM +0000, Till Hofmann wrote:
> > Regarding ROS: I've been packaging ROS in a COPR for a quite a while
> > (since 2017):
> >
> > https://github.com/morxa/rosfed
> > https://copr.fedorainfracloud.org/coprs/thofmann/ros/
>
> Quick question -- this is "original" ROS, not ROS 2, right?

Yes, we have some early attempts in our team to also build ROS2 with 
rosfed, but AFAIK this has not gone very far (yet).

[Matthew Miller]

On Wed, Nov 24, 2021 at 10:09:36PM +0330, Hedayat Vatankhah wrote:
> I also think Robotics Suite makes sense as a spin rather than set of
> containers (specially since we have GUI packages too, which can't be
> ordinary containers); but I also agree that it might not get used & tested
> much.

I wonder if a refresh of this could be an exploratory point for making
"software suites" of some sort to show up in GNOME Software (and DNF
Dragora), rather than as installation media.

[Geoff]

Hi,

I haven't contributed to this SIG, but I have watched it for a while as I
use Fedora on my main machine, but I use Ubuntu/ROS with my research.  In
general it's hard to get groups of any kind of people to switch from Ubuntu
to Fedora for ROS when there is a lot of additional setup and compilation.
Containers are a great way to introduce and show people what could be
possible with Fedora.  Our robotics development environment is now
completely embedded inside of a docker image.  This is great because we
have a very complicated setup that takes time to install on individual
developer machines.  It's also used for all of our CI-CD.  Also because
everything is in a docker image I can run the docker image of Ubuntu+ROS on
my fedora machine (including all GUI packages and hardware acceleration for
our simulations).  It's even possible to run it on Windows now.  If there
was a docker image of fedora+ROS I could relatively easily try to get our
software framework running natively in Fedora.  I think it would also
encourage more people to try out the spin.

Geoff

On Wed, 24 Nov 2021 at 10:41, Hedayat Vatankhah  wrote:
> On ۱۴۰۰/۹/۱ ۹:۴۴ بعدازظهر, Matthew Miller wrote:
>
> Hi, possible Robotics SIG folks!
>
> I know a lot of the base packages in https://labs.fedoraproject.org/en/robotics/ are still being maintained and updated, but I'm curious about the future of the Suite itself.
>
> I've gotten some pings recently about ROS (https://www.ros.org/), and wonder if any of the folks here (if anyone is still around) has any interest.
>
> I'm also curious if Robotics Suite still makes sense as a spin, or if might be better as a set of containers and use case for Fedora IoT.
>
> If anyone's still around, I'd love your thoughts!
>
> I also think Robotics Suite makes sense as a spin rather than set of
> containers (specially since we have GUI packages too, which can't be
> ordinary containers); but I also agree that it might not get used & tested
> much.
>
> Regards,
>
> Hedayat
>
> robotics mailing list -- [e-mail]
> To unsubscribe send an email to [e-mail]
> Fedora Code of Conduct:
> https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/project/code-of-conduct/
> List Guidelines: https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Mailing_list_guidelines
> List Archives:
> https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/[e-mail].o...
> Do not reply to spam on the list, report it:
> https://pagure.io/fedora-infrastructure

[Rich Mattes]

On 11/22/21 1:14 PM, Matthew Miller wrote:
> Hi, possible Robotics SIG folks!
>
> I know a lot of the base packages in https://labs.fedoraproject.org/en/robotics/ are still being maintained and updated, but I'm curious about the future of the Suite itself.
>
> I've gotten some pings recently about ROS (https://www.ros.org/), and wonder if any of the folks here (if anyone is still around) has any interest.
>
> I'm also curious if Robotics Suite still makes sense as a spin, or if might be better as a set of containers and use case for Fedora IoT.
>
> If anyone's still around, I'd love your thoughts!

Hi Matthew,

I've been keeping the spin alive in the hopes that it's useful to 
someone, but I haven't put a lot of time into improving/maintaining it 
lately.  Partly because somewhere along the line the tools to build 
images changed and I haven't been able to build or test anything outside 
of koji for a long time, and partly because I don't have a lot of free 
time to take care of it in addition to my packages.  If someone has a 
better idea for how to distribute the robotics-related packages, and has 
time to do the work, that's great.  I don't think IoT is a particularly 
good match - the spin is more focused on providing a development 
environment and not an embedded/deployable image.

A lot of us are interested in packaging ROS for Fedora.  In fact, one of 
the early efforts of this SIG was to get some of the core ROS packages 
into Fedora proper a long time ago[1], but we didn't have enough effort 
to follow through and the project has long since been abandoned.  Till 
has been vastly more successful with his copr packaging tools.

Open Robotics is starting to build ROS 2 packages for RHEL8[2][3], maybe 
there's a path to working with upstream to support fedora as part of 
their process?  I'm certainly willing to discuss a path forward for 
making ROS easier to use on Fedora as well.

Rich

[1] https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/SIGs/Robotics/ROS_Packaging
[2] 
https://docs.ros.org/en/foxy/Releases/Release-Galactic-Geochelone.html#suppo...
[3] https://www.therobotreport.com/open-robotics-ros-2-galactic-geochelone/

[Till Hofmann]

On 11/25/21 01:32, Rich Mattes wrote:
> On 11/22/21 1:14 PM, Matthew Miller wrote:
> > Hi, possible Robotics SIG folks!
> >
> > I know a lot of the base packages in 
> > https://labs.fedoraproject.org/en/robotics/ are still being 
> > maintained and updated, but I'm curious about the future of the Suite 
> > itself.
> >
> > I've gotten some pings recently about ROS (https://www.ros.org/), and 
> > wonder if any of the folks here (if anyone is still around) has any 
> > interest.
> >
> > I'm also curious if Robotics Suite still makes sense as a spin, or if 
> > might be better as a set of containers and use case for Fedora IoT.
> >
> > If anyone's still around, I'd love your thoughts!
>
> Hi Matthew,
>
> I've been keeping the spin alive in the hopes that it's useful to 
> someone, but I haven't put a lot of time into improving/maintaining it 
> lately.  Partly because somewhere along the line the tools to build 
> images changed and I haven't been able to build or test anything 
> outside of koji for a long time, and partly because I don't have a lot 
> of free time to take care of it in addition to my packages.  If 
> someone has a better idea for how to distribute the robotics-related 
> packages, and has time to do the work, that's great.  I don't think 
> IoT is a particularly good match - the spin is more focused on 
> providing a development environment and not an embedded/deployable image.
>
> A lot of us are interested in packaging ROS for Fedora.  In fact, one 
> of the early efforts of this SIG was to get some of the core ROS 
> packages into Fedora proper a long time ago[1], but we didn't have 
> enough effort to follow through and the project has long since been 
> abandoned.  Till has been vastly more successful with his copr 
> packaging tools.
>
> Open Robotics is starting to build ROS 2 packages for RHEL8[2][3], 
> maybe there's a path to working with upstream to support fedora as 
> part of their process?  I'm certainly willing to discuss a path 
> forward for making ROS easier to use on Fedora as well.

I'd definitely be interested in packaging ROS2 and/or getting the ROS 
packages into Fedora proper. Working with upstream sounds like a 
reasonable approach :) There's been also some discussion with upstream a 
while ago:
https://github.com/ros/rosdistro/issues/4918#issuecomment-807974543

Somewhat unsurprisingly, they have a slightly different perspective on 
things. They come from ROS and want to make their build tools somehow 
independent of the distro. We as Fedora packagers on the other hand have 
a specific distro in mind and want to make the build process independent 
of the software we are building, so that's definitely a mismatch :) 
Which is probably why the discussion did not lead to any results. But 
back then, they said they do not plan to build for Fedora or RHEL, 
apparently they have changed their minds. I haven't looked into the ROS 
RPMs they are providing. Has anyone used them?

[Javier Martinez Canillas]

Hello Till,

First of all, thanks a lot for your work and maintaining your COPR.

On Sat, Nov 27, 2021 at 11:22 AM Till Hofmann
 wrote:
>

[snip]
> > Open Robotics is starting to build ROS 2 packages for RHEL8[2][3],
> > maybe there's a path to working with upstream to support fedora as
> > part of their process?  I'm certainly willing to discuss a path
> > forward for making ROS easier to use on Fedora as well.
>
> I'd definitely be interested in packaging ROS2 and/or getting the ROS
> packages into Fedora proper. Working with upstream sounds like a

I'm also interested in getting the ROS packages into Fedora proper.
Have contributed a little bit to your rosfed tool so I've experience
with the spec generation bits.

Please let me know how I can help. Maybe we can track the effort as
issues in the rosfed repo ?

Best regards,
Javier