Task 1 : Loading Robots in RViz

Objective : The objective of this ROS module is to familiarize with loading of Robot models in RViz and Gazebo.

• [ ] Select a robot of your choice from the list given below :
  1. Franka Research 3
  2. Kuka IIRW 7 / Kuka IIRW 14
  3. Open Manipulator X
  4. Kinova Jaco Robot
• [ ] Download the URDF / XACRO File of the Robot
• [ ] Learn to Visualise the Robot in RViz.
  1. You should be able to play with different joint positions and see the robot move in the RViz Interface. You can either write code to interact with the robot or use an existing GUI Interface to play with the joints of the robot.
  2. Learn to launch the Robot in RViz by learning to write .launch files. (Note : This is an important concept in ROS and you should focus on understanding how to write launch files in depth.)

Task 2 : Loading Robots in Gazebo

Objective : Now that you have achieved the goal of loading and visualising the robots in RViz, now let us go to physics engine simulations. The next objective is to load the Robot in Gazebo and write a short code to move between 3 positions (Cartesian Positions) input by the user.

• [ ] For this task you can use the same URDF / XACRO File of the robot from Task 1.
• [ ] Download the controller.yaml file. You can find this in the description packages from where you downloaded the URDF / XACRO file. (You can contact the TAs if you are having difficulty in downloading the controller files).
• [ ] You would need to be able to publish the joint states for each joints. (Hint : Use KDL Library or a similar robotics library to convert cartesian space to joint space)
• [ ] Now you should create a python script to input the cartesian positions → convert to joint positions → publish this to your robot in simulation.