[ros-users] [Discourse.ros.org] [Embedded] Installing Ubuntu 18.04 arm64v8 on Raspberry Pi 3

[Chris]

I actually did spend some time getting ROS2 working on the Raspberry Pi 3b+ a few months ago.  I took two different paths to get there:

1.  I recompiled all of ROS2 on the 32-bit Raspberry Pi distribution that is the default for Ubuntu 18.04.  This worked fine, with the caveat that you have to build everything sequentially since some things take too much memory.  I ended up using `MAKEFLAGS="-j1 -l1" colcon build --executor sequential`.  The big downside to this approach is that the ROS2 CI doesn't regularly build or test against 32-bit ARM, so things may not work exactly as expected.
1.  I switched the Ubuntu 18.04 distribution running on the Raspberry Pi 3b+ over to 64-bit, and then was able to install ARM64 packages.  Unfortunately, this is a bit of a process (it took me about 2 hours to do).  The basic steps are:
    1.  Follow the instructions at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ARM/RaspberryPi to install Ubuntu 18.04 32-bit on the Raspberry Pi 3b+ (this is a bit of a process on its own, but just follow through that guide)
    1.  Once you have successfully booted the 32-bit distribution, we can start the steps to switch to 64-bit.  The basic instructions for switching the processor mode and kernel over to 64-bit are also at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ARM/RaspberryPi#Ubuntu_arm64.2FAArch64
    1.  After rebooting, you'll be running a 32-bit userland on a 64-bit kernel.  To switch to a 64-bit userland, you need to manually install all of the `:arm64` versions of the packages and removing the equivalent `:armhf` versions.  I ended up starting with leaf packages and making my way towards core packages, but it may be easier to start the other way around.  In any case, after dealing with some minor fallout from doing that, and rebooting, I had a full 64-bit kernel and userland that I was able to install ROS2 packages arm64 packages on.

Hope this helps a bit; let me know if you need additional information, since I elided my detailed notes here for brevity.





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