How to setup ardupilot simulation environment in Ubuntu

ROS is a popular and useful software framework in robotics area. Gazebo is a powerful robotic simulator. Ardupilot provide a tutorial for sitl simulation in ROS/Gazebo environment. I tried to setup this environment in my mac. Here I share the record of my steps.

Set up ROS Gazebo APM SITL environment on Ubuntu

Install Ubuntu 14.04.3

1. Download Ubuntu 14.04.3 64bit desktop edition image from ubuntu.com
2. Install the system in virtual machine or as second operating system
3. Set the username as developer and password as 12345678

Clone ardupilot source

1. open terminal in ubuntu
2. run sudo apt-get install git
3. make a directory:mkdir workspace
4. enter the workspace: cd workspace
5. clone the source from github:git clone https://github.com/alexbuyval/ardupilot
6. cd ardupilot directory and check out RangeFinderSITL2:cd ardupilot
7. git checkout RangeFinderSITL2

Install ROS

1. sudo sh -c 'echo "deb http://packages.ros.org/ros/ubuntu $(lsb_release -sc) main" > /etc/apt/sources.list.d/ros-latest.list'
2. sudo apt-key adv --keyserver hkp://pool.sks-keyservers.net --recv-key 0xB01FA116
3. sudo apt-get update
4. sudo apt-get install ros-indigo-desktop-full
5. sudo rosdep init
6. rosdep update
7. echo "source /opt/ros/indigo/setup.bash" >> ~/.bashrc
8. source ~/.bashrc
9. sudo apt-get install python-rosinstall

Create ROS Workspace

1. mkdir -p ~/catkin_ws/src
2. cd ~/catkin_ws/src
3. catkin_init_workspace
4. cd ~/catkin_ws/
5. catkin_make
6. echo "source $HOME/catkin_ws/devel/setup.bash" >> ~/.bashrc
7. source ~/.bashrc
8. echo $ROS_PACKAGE_PATH
9. if you can see the following message, it’s successful:/home/developer/catkin_ws/src:/opt/ros/indigo/share:/opt/ros/indigo/stacks

Clone/Install ROS package

1. sudo apt-get install ros-indigo-octomap-msgs
   2.

    roscd
    cd ../src #Navigate in your ROS user source files directory
    git clone https://[email protected]/alexbuyval/arducopter_sitl_ros.git
    git clone https://github.com/PX4/mav_comm.git
    git clone https://github.com/alexbuyval/rotors_simulator.git
    git clone https://github.com/ros-drivers/joystick_drivers.git
    git clone https://github.com/ethz-asl/glog_catkin.git
    git clone https://github.com/catkin/catkin_simple.git
    git clone https://github.com/ethz-asl/gflags_catkin.git
    cd rotors_simulator
    git checkout sonar_plugin
    cd ../..
    wstool init src
    wstool set -t src mavros --git https://github.com/alexbuyval/mavros.git
    wstool update -t src
    rosdep install --from-paths src --ignore-src --rosdistro indigo -y
    
   

2. compile the packages:roscd
3. cd ..
4. catkin_make
5. if the catkin-make failed bacause the lack of gawk, run sudo apt-get install gawk
6. setup PATH: echo 'PATH="$PATH:/home/developer/workspace/ardupilot/Tools/autotest"' >> ~/.profile

Install necessary python package

1. sudo apt-get install python-pip
2. sudo pip install pymavlink

Run the simulation

1. cd ~/workspace/ardupilot/ArduCopter
2. sim_vehicle.sh -f arducopter_sitl_ros --console

The simulation view

Reference

Using ROS/Gazebo Simulator with SITL