With ROS, creating a robotic system means developing programs in C++ or Python, making ROS inaccessible to all non-developer experts: process engineers, industrialization engineers...
Writing code is indeed becoming essential for complex robots.
However, for several years now, an alternative method has been making headway: no-code. This consists of designing computer programs without writing code, often via a graphic interface. This project consists of developing a prototype of a "no-code ROS" that can be used to program manipulative robots under MoveIt and rolling robots.
Ronoco connects to the ROS ecosystem and generates standard ROS messages, maintaining the interoperable ROS (robot-agnostic) DNA.
The ronoco project is divide into three distinct modules, each fulfilling different and complementary roles to provide a graphical interface for designing ROS manipulation programs.
The three modules are ronoco-vm a ROS package consisting of a flask API that interprets the sequence of blocks in the GUI and translates them into ROS code. The second is ronoco-nodered, an extension to the Node-RED application that allows you to graphically create action sequences using behaviour trees
The last one is ronoco-ui a web client allowing to use the two previous modules. It provides utilities for the robot (registering positions, launching a program, stopping the server etc). Moreover, it allows defining programs using a no-code interface like NodeRed or Scratch (WIP)
Can ronoco be used on my robot?
To use ronoco with your robot it is necessary that it has the following specifications:
- For a manipulator robot it is necessary that it is compatible with MoveIt. Ronoco mainly uses MoveIt to control the manipulator robots and the rviz visualization topics
- For a rolling robot it is necessary that it is compatible with MoveBase. Ronoco uses the SimpleActionClient of move base for navigation. The robot will also have to provide a topic where it publishes its current position (typically /amcl_pose) as well as a topic allowing it to be teleoperated (typically /cmd_vel)
If your robot meets these specifications you can use ronoco with it!