Hi Ken,

> 2) Interfaces. The plan is to convert the Node API clearsilver specs
> on the wiki into actual YAML node specifications. The idea here is
> multifold:
>
>  i) Machine-readable spec of what topics, services, parameters, etc..
> a node provides/uses. This is useful for validation, documentation,
> GUIs, etc...
>  ii) Machine-readable spec that can be used to bootstrap a node initialization
>  iii) Standardization of common APIs (e.g. camera interface)

This is a concept that I was pretty excited about, and which I put
into dynamic_reconfigure from the start. I'm now finding it to be
pretty limiting for some nodes, such as the pr2_camera_synchronizer.

The guts of the synchronizer are very flexible, and able to
accommodate new cameras, triggers and projectors. Ideally, I would
like to use parameters to tell the camera_synchronizer what the
hardware it is working with is, but I currently can't do that because
the parameters are set at compile time.

I'd love to discuss your ideas for a Node spec that would allow
parameter-dependent parameters, services, etc. Or is the idea that the
spec would not be all-encompassing for a node like the
camera_synchronizer? (Right now I'm toying with allowing dynamic
generation of the dynamic_reconfigure configuration.)

Blaise