According to one recent study, there were approximately 3.6 million industrial robots in use across the globe as of 2022. There were also approximately 31 million robots of various types in use in homes across the United States as of 2019. If it's starting to feel like robots are everywhere, you're clearly not imagining things!
But while it's easy to get distracted by the often state-of-the-art hardware when it comes to robotics, one must not ignore the equally powerful software at the heart of it all. That, in essence, is the concept behind Robot Operating System. Also called Robot OS or ROS for short, it's a suite of tools often used to bring groundbreaking robotics applications to life in more ways than one.
The Basics of ROS: Breaking Things Down
Despite the name, it's important to note that ROS is not actually an "operating system" in the traditional sense of the term. Rather, it's a framework and a collection of tools that give developers access to the resources they need to build sophisticated robotics applications.
Essentially, it's a set of libraries and related tools that help you take the robot application you see in your head and bring it into reality in the most efficient way possible. It offers access to everything one would need - from drivers to algorithms and beyond. It also offers tools for testing and even acts as a way for processes to communicate with one another across more than one machine.
All told, there are more than 2000 packages that makeup ROS as of 2022. Each one offers specialized functionality. Truly, there is an option for just about everything. If you have a drone and you need an easy way to compute its trajectory, there is a package available. If you need to make adjustments to a critical algorithm, there is a package available. If you want to add remote control functionality, there is a package available.
For a lot of people, the major benefit is that ROS allows you to create complicated applications even if you don't know how a particular piece of hardware works. In other words, you don't have to know how to build a robot from scratch in order to get it to do what you want.
Using ROS, developers can bring together a network of specifically selected processes called nodes via a central hub. One node can be run on more than one device at a time provided that they're all connected to that original hub.
In addition to the fact that ROS is inherently robust, one of the things that truly makes it awesome comes by way of the fact that it is open-source. Think of ROS as almost something of a collective - an opportunity for engineers, developers, and even hobbyists to come together to all make meaningful contributions to the larger whole.
Not only does this help make robotics applications better and more efficient, but it also goes a long way towards making them accessible to as many people as possible as well.
Another major advantage of ROS is that it was designed in a way that allows its base code to be applied across virtually all robotics platforms. That includes not only things like drones but also mobile bases, arms, and more. Once you design a set of processes that work, you don't have to re-build it for every other platform you're working with. You can re-use that code to get to the end result as quickly as possible.
Robots that are powered by ROS libraries and tools can also use any programming language, which bakes an essential flexibility into the development process. If one of your notes uses C++ and another uses Python, for example, you don't have to worry about any issues when it comes to sending and receiving data. Everything was intended to be as straightforward as possible so that you can finally stop worrying about the limitations of the underlying technology and start putting it all to good use.
In the end, it's important to keep in mind that the initial release of ROS came in 2007, or 16 years ago. In that time, it's grown and evolved to the point where it isn't just versatile. It isn't just flexible. It isn't just "getting people interested in robotics and what they can do."
It's literally grown into the largest robotic developer community anywhere on the planet today. That is awesome, regardless of how you look at it.
The HeroX Approach: Pushing Boundaries One challenge at a Time
At HeroX, we see ourselves as so much more than just another crowd sourcing platform. We offer an opportunity for anyone in our ever-expanding global community to not only create unique and exciting challenges of their own, but to submit solutions to ones that are already posted.
Case in point: this TII Infrared Tracking Challenge, which is wholly relevant to the topic of ROS and related technologies. Here, you'll find better ways to track objects in low-light conditions for unmanned ground vehicles in heterogeneous environments. Innovators, students, start-ups, and research institutes are all encouraged to solve this challenge for their chance to win part of the $75,000 prize purse.
To find out more information, or to try to solve the TII Infrared Tracking Challenge, follow this link to get started.
