[ros-users] [Discourse.ros.org] [General] ROS TSC Meeting Notes 2019-01-17

Mon Feb 4 01:50:59 UTC 2019

# ROS 2 TSC Meeting Minutes: January 17th, 2019

These notes are being published a bit later than usual due to travel schedules. We'll aim to be more timely with publishing these notes following future meetings.

* Attendees:
  * Allison (TRI)
  * Bob S (TARDEC)
  * Brian G. (Open Robotics)
  * Brian S. (LGE)
  * Dejan (Apex.AI)
  * Dirk (Open Robotics)
  * Doug (Amazon)
  * Karsten (Bosch)
  * Lou (Microsoft)
  * Louise (Open Robotics)
  * Matt D (TARDEC)
  * Matt H (Intel)
  * Pyo (ROBOTIS)
  * Seonman (LGE)
  * Tully (Open Robotics)
* (5 mins) [update] ROS copyright status (Brian)
  * Pending questions (type of mark, description, and industry categories) answered; waiting on legal feedback.
* (5 mins) [update] DCO bot status (Dirk)
  * https://discourse.ros.org/t/starting-to-enforce-developer-certificate-of-origin-dco-for-some-ros-2-repos/7420
  * Test repositories deployed, waiting for some feedback before deploying it widely. Not yet enforced for existing PRs.
  * Plan to turn on enforcement and extend to more repositories in a few weeks.
* (5 mins) [update] Elevator pitch on ROS 2 (Brian)
  * From Matt H.: ROS2 benefits key talking points - I had requested we create a short list of talking points we can all quickly refer to when asked what the benefits of ROS2 are over ROS. I know there was a presentation on this at ROSCon a few years back but it’s not really easy to point people to that. I think a “30-second elevator pitch” is more like what I’m looking for. I believe you said you would work on that?
    * No update; Brian to generate
* (5 mins) [discussion] New WGs (Matt H.)
  * Is there any interest from TSC members for a Real-time WG and a Safety WG? If so, do we have anyone who would lead either of those WGs?
    * DP: Apex has been working on this. Can share their existing internal research.
    * MH: Can be a forum for collaboration,
    * KK: Interest from Bosch side
    * MD: Large group interested in realtime from government sources
    * Dejan is willing to lead a realtime group with Apex, Bosch and ROS-M participants.
  * Updates from existing WGs
    * Security
      * DF: Ray Cole from AWS is current lead; need to check on whether to continue as-is.
    * Navigation
      * MH: on hiatus since Crystal; just getting restarted
* (10 mins) [discussion] New members (Brian)
  * Feedback on Process
    * KK: It would be nice to have some metrics for contributions measurements in the applications
    * What is in the ROS Core and subject to evaluation? It’s specifically vague to not box ourselves in.
    * DT: Should past contributions be required versus an intent to make contributions?
    * Feedback to applicants to encourage continuing engagement for future reevaluation.
  * Ratified adding 2 new members: Acutronic Robotics, eProsima
* (20 mins) [update & discussion] Debrief on Crystal release (Dirk)
  * What got in (high level view)
    * C++ client library
      * Actions
    * Python client library
      * Parameters
      * Clock, time, rate, timers
    * Launch
      * Life cycle nodes
      * Nesting of launch files
      * Passing parameters
    * Rosbag
      * Record and playback of binary messages
      * Command line tool
    * Feature packages
      * Image transport
      * Gazebo ROS packages
      * Navigation2
      * rqt
    * index.ros.org
  * What slipped (high level view)
    * Actions in Python (might be released in a patch release)
    * IDL pipeline (-> Dashing)
    * Launching components (-> Dashing)
    * Rosbag playback of ROS 1 bag files
    * Buildfarm improvements (almost complete, will be rolled out independently)
    * Audit Memory Management (some parts have landed, but still ongoing)
    * Logging improvements, e.g. log to /rosout topic (might be released in a patch release)
    * SROS2
  * Syncs / patch releases
    * Syncs will happen roughly every two weeks (if there are new / updated packages), announced via Discourse (as for any ROS distro) [Coordinated on Discourse](https://discourse.ros.org/c/release/crystal)
    * Patch releases (meaning releases of core packages maintained by Open Robotics) happen on demand, will be available with the next sync
      * Exact changes are tracked in a meta ticket, e.g. for the first patch release: https://github.com/ros2/ros2/issues/638
  * Process changes that are already planned for future distributions
    * Schedule high-impact and/or invasive changes early in the cycle
    * Set freeze dates earlier in the cycle and being strict about them
      * Allowing time for the community to support testing
    * Plan resources for increased review needs before the freeze dates
    * Shorter turnaround time on tickets in general
  * Take feedback from the group on other changes
* (10 mins) [proposal] Dashing release plan (Dirk)
  * Release date: Fri. May 31st 2019
  * Dates prior to the release
    * Mon. Apr 8th: First releases of core packages available (alpha)
      * Testing can happen from now on (some features might not have landed yet)
    * Thu. May 2nd: API freeze for core packages
    * Mon. May 6th: Updated releases of core packages available (beta)
      * Additional testing of the latest features
    * Thu. May 16th: Code freeze
      * Only bug fix releases should be made after this point
      * New packages can be released independently
    * Mon. May 20th: Updated releases of core packages available (release candidate)
    * Wed. May 29th: Freeze rosdistro
      * No PRs for Dashing on the `rosdistro` repo will be merged (reopens after the release announcement)
  * Support period and LTS status
    * Dashing is the first ROS 2 LTS, with 2 years’ support (through May 2021)
  * Tentative plan for future releases
    * E-turtle release: Nov 22nd 2019
      * Sandwiched between ROSCon (Oct 31-Nov 1) / IROS (Nov 3-8) and US Thanksgiving (Nov 28)
      * Not an LTS, 1 year support
    * F-turtle release (same time as ROS 1 Noetic): May 2020
      * LTS, likely longer support period (e.g., 3+ years)
      * The goal is to target Ubuntu 20.04
  * Supported platforms (update to REP 2000) proposal:
    * Tier 1:
      * Ubuntu 18.04 (Bionic), amd64 and ARMv8
        * Same as for Crystal
      * macOS 10.14 (Mojave)
        * Upgrade from 10.12 (Sierra)
      * Windows 10
        * Same as for Crystal
    * Tier 2:
      * Discontinue from-source support for Ubuntu 16.04 (Xenial)
    * Tier 3:
      * Debian 9 (Stretch)
        * Same as for Crystal
        * Option: if Debian 10 (Buster) is available in time, upgrade
    * No change on RMW implementations
    * Minimum dependency versions will increase with the removal of Ubuntu 16.04 (Xenial) (and eventually Debian 9 (Stretch))
    * Request for information about Armhf vs arm64 vs amd64 usage:
      * Best info in [Metrics reports](https://wiki.ros.org/Metrics) latest: [2018](http://download.ros.org/downloads/metrics/metrics-report-2018-07.pdf)
* (15 mins) Roadmap for Dashing (Dirk)
  * Open Robotics planned items (high level view):
    * Launch
      * Launching components, passing arguments to components, CMake API to create shared libraries of components
      * Enable testing, replacing the legacy API
      * XML(/YAML) front-end for launch
    * IDL pipeline
    * Efficient image pipeline, address shortcomings in intra-process comms
    * Parameter
      * Declaration of ranges, rqt-based UI
      * Read-only parameters
    * Improve memory management
    * Improve performance and reliability
    * Port to ROS 2
      * rosbridge_suite
      * Support migration of MoveIt
    * CI for simulation-based testing of navigation
    * Buildfarm infrastructure
      * Roll out incremental CI jobs
      * RPM packages
    * Need to add:
      * improved docs and testing (to support LTS label)
      * Update navigation2 to use native ROS 2 components (actions, dynamic params)
  * Solicit additions from TSC members
    * (Pyo) support [cartographer_ros](https://github.com/ros2/cartographer_ros/issues/23) package. There’s been a lot of changes on v1.0.0, It does not work with the current ROS 2 Crystal version. so we are porting to ROS 2. We are preparing the real mobile robot (TurtleBot3 and mobile platform of LG CLOi) to run actually SLAM and navigation in the ROS 2 Dashing version. https://github.com/ROBOTIS-GIT/cartographer_ros/tree/crystal
    * (Dejan) next generation of integration test framework
    * (Lou) Windows builds, CI, Simulation and Testing on Azure DevOps
      * ROS 1 / ROS 2 coexistence, ros1_bridge
    * (Karsten) considering diagnostics
    * (Karsten) ros_control (pending MoveIt! port progress)
    * (Doug) input to come via tickets
    * (Dejan) funding eProsima on performance improvements in FastRTPS
    * (Brian Shin) improving ROS 2 OpenEmbedded support, working with ROBOTIS for TB3
* Looking forward for next meeting. Opinions on timing past cycle has been 6 weeks?
  * A little faster at 4 weeks would be good for keeping things going. +1 Lou, Doug, Dejan
    * Gerkey will do that and schedule out through dashing release

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