[ros-users] ROS & DDS

Christian Schlegel schlegel at hs-ulm.de
Fri Feb 14 14:20:53 UTC 2014


Hi,

Indeed, ease of use is decisive but it should not come with ignoring major technical needs (complex robotic systems depend on advanced technologies like those from domains like distributed systems and software engineering).

Again: 
communication patterns provide two views. 
One is a precise interface and semantics exposed to the robotics community. Make their live as simple as possible and match their needs.
The other is the interface to the underlying middleware which is not seen by robotics users but just by framework builders and middleware experts. They do all the mappings duch that the agreed semantics remains the same whatever middleware mapping you prefer. They keep the middleware away from the robotics people!

This way, it is also completely transparent to the robotics community which mapping you prefer and how finally messages are transmitted (even in "any" types of DDL)

The way to go is to introduce this separation of concerns: precise semantics and stable interfaces for robotics people and internal stable interfaces towards middleware used by framework builders, middleware experts to map communication patterns but not visible to robotics.

Christian

---
Prof. Dr. Christian Schlegel
Prodekan, Studiendekan Master IS
Fakultät Informatik
Hochschule Ulm

Tel.: 0731 / 50-28242

http://www.hs-ulm.de/schlegel
http://www.zafh-servicerobotik.de/
http://www.youtube.com/user/roboticsathsulm
http://smart-robotics.sourceforge.net/
http://www.joser.org/

> Am 14.02.2014 um 15:05 schrieb "Ryan Gariepy" <rgariepy at clearpathrobotics.com>:
> 
> Ease of use is *critical*. We're already receiving regular feedback
> that the usability of ROS is getting worse with each distribution.
> 
> -Ryan
> 
>> On Fri, Feb 14, 2014 at 8:43 AM, Ingo Lütkebohle <iluetkeb at gmail.com> wrote:
>>> On Fri, Feb 14, 2014 at 2:27 PM, Edwards, Shaun M. <sedwards at swri.org> wrote:
>>> My main concerns is Geoffrey Biggs' comment below.  Tuning should be a dirty
>>> word in software.  I know it's needed, but successful software just works.
>>> Ease of use should always be our focus.  It is this single issue that has
>>> been the nail in the coffin of every middleware I have used.
>> 
>> I agree on that.
>> 
>> One could reasonably argue that the attempt to solve the communication
>> problem in a relatively application-independent manner is doomed, and
>> that application-specific protocols are the way to go. Some people may
>> dismiss that as unrealistic, but I would argue that
>> application-specific protocols are the IETF approach, and that it has
>> been fairly successful, so far.
>> 
>> That said, there is a question of what the basis for such developments
>> should be, or, in other words, whether the protocols in the DDS family
>> are a better foundation for robotics applications than base-level
>> TCP/IP.
>> 
>> I guess answers to that question will be influenced significantly by
>> whether you're coming from an enterprise environment, or from an open
>> systems environment.
>> 
>> cheers
>> 
>> --
>> Ingo Lütkebohle, Dr.-Ing.
>> Machine Learning and Robotics Lab, IPVS, Universität Stuttgart
>> http://www.ipvs.uni-stuttgart.de/abteilungen/mlr/abteilung/mitarbeiter/Ingo.Luetkebohle
>> +49-711-685-88350
>> 
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