Autonomous Outdoor 3D Point Clouds Scanning via Path Planning

Keyword

Husky robot; Unmanned vehicle; LiDAR; 3D Point Clouds; Autonomous driving; Logistics vehicles

Introduction

This is a simple version (based on ros gazebo) for outdoor mobile robot Husky to explore the unknown outdoor scenes. This implementation is on ROS indigo version, and a kenetic or melodic(recommended) based implementation can be found in other branch of this depository. The indigo version is more stable because it is consistent with Husky office packages.

The related work is published in Autonomous Outdoor Scanning via Online Topological and Geometric Path Optimization, IEEE Transactions on Intelligent Transportation Systems, DOI: 10.1109/TITS.2020.3039557.

Installation

Makesure you have a ubuntu14.04 system with high version cmake(>=3.1.3), gcc(>=5.5), g++(>=5.5), which are to support c++ 14 standard (LOAM needs, see LOAM)

The system is based on ROS - Indigo and particularly the Gazebo.

Please follow the following steps in order to install the package along with its dependences:

• Install ROS-Indigo full desktop (guide).

• Install Husky official package (guide)

• Install the grid_map package that can be optionally used for mapping (guide):

  sudo apt-get install ros-indigo-grid-map

  Please note that this package upon is located in the main server of ubuntu, not in some mirror servers. Alternatively, you can also build it from source.

• Install ROS-Indigo move base package if you need:

  sudo apt-get install ros-indigo-navigation

• check whether other dependences of Husky package is need. cd your own ros work space where this package is placed or cloned:

catkin_make -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release

• Set the environment variables:
  1. set the environment variable at ~/.bashrc as:

     gedit ~/.bashrc 

  2. set the environment variable of husky_custom_description for your own custom robot model:

     export HUSKY_URDF_EXTRAS=$(rospack find husky_custom_description)/urdf/custom_description.urdf.xacro

         So far, there should have been two environment variables on the ~/.bashrc file as shown below:

     export HUSKY_GAZEBO_DESCRIPTION=$(rospack find husky_gazebo)/urdf/description.gazebo.xacro
     export HUSKY_URDF_EXTRAS=$(rospack find husky_custom_description)/urdf/custom_description.urdf.xacro

  3. Modify HUSKY official file, which would cause a bug when loading customized robot urdf file. (see Husky_description_issue) Insert the --inorder option in /husky_gazebo/launch/spawn_husky.launch as shown below:

     <param name="robot_description" 
     command="$(find xacro)/xacro '$(arg husky_gazebo_description)'
             laser_enabled:=$(arg laser_enabled)
             ur5_enabled:=$(arg ur5_enabled)
             kinect_enabled:=$(arg kinect_enabled)
             --inorder
             " />

Running

setup the environment variables of your ros private workspace Run source devel/setup.bash in project root in order to add ros package path. Instead, We strongly recommend writing the variables into ~/.bashrc so that you don't need to set up environment variables any more when you run this project.

launches customized husky gazebo (gazebo).

roslaunch husky_gazebo husky_playpen.launch

launches customized husky visualization (rviz).

roslaunch husky_viz view_robot.launch

LOAM can be used to SLAM (mapping and location robot) as follow(gp-insac algorithm is launched parallelly, which is to devide ground, obstacle and boundary points):

roslaunch loam_velodyne loam_velodyne.launch

For mapping with topological and geometrical information. It should be noted that this node has a countdown of ten seconds. If it still have not received the data from LOAM node after the countdown, it will be automatically terminated.

roslaunch topo_confidence_map mapping.launch

To automatically send the goal of mapping results to husky moving action

roslaunch husky_navigation_goals send_goal.launch 

Parameters

Output the result in your own path, please modify below codes in /topo_confidence_map/launch/mapping.launch:

<arg name="fileoutputpath" default="/home/yourname/"/>

SLAM and ground detection parameters are list in loam_velodyne/launch/loam_velodyne.launch.
Mapping parameters are list in topo_confidence_map/launch/mapping.launch.

Issues

Issues occur mainly because the version of gcc, g++, or other third-party libraries in customized system are too old. The following env configuration problems and corresponding solutions may be helpful:

1. Could not find a package configuration file provided by "move_base_msgs" with any of the following names:

move_base_msgsConfig.cmake
move_base_msgs-config.cmake

solution:

sudo apt-get install ros-indigo-navigation

2. CMake 3.1.3 or higher is required (This is a requirement from LOAM package). Update your cmake, see CMAKE INSTALL. WARNING: this command sudo apt remove cmake would also remove ros system from your computer.

3. Eigen3, this is a requirement from LOAM package, project has been updated and this issues seems to be solved. Could not find a package configuration file provided by "Eigen3" with any of the following names:

Eigen3Config.cmake
eigen3-config.cmake

solution: Type in the terminal

locate FindEigen3.cmake 

copy the FindEigen3.cmake to Husky_Simulation/loam_velodyne/.

In Husky_Simulation/loam_velodyne/CMakeLists.txt insert sentence set(CMAKE_MODULE_PATH ${CMAKE_CURRENT_SOURCE_DIR}):

.....
set(CMAKE_MODULE_PATH ${CMAKE_CURRENT_SOURCE_DIR}) //add this sentence
find_package(Eigen3 REQUIRED)
find_package(PCL REQUIRED)
.....

4. MultiScanRegistration.cpp:178:76: error: parameter declared ‘auto’ (This is a requirement from LOAM package). This is because the current CMake, g++ or gcc can not automatically recognize the C++ 11/14 standard syntax, which appears in 'loam_velodyne' package. First step, update your gcc and g++ version to support c++11/14 standard. Assuming the current gcc and g++ version is 4.8, type in terminal as below to get a 5.0 version:

sudo apt-get install python-software-properties
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ubuntu-toolchain-r/test
sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install gcc-5         
sudo apt-get install g++-5
sudo apt-get install gcc-5-multilib 
sudo apt-get install g++-5-multilib
sudo update-alternatives --install /usr/bin/g++ g++ /usr/bin/g++-5 100
sudo update-alternatives --install /usr/bin/g++ g++ /usr/bin/g++-4.8 30
sudo update-alternatives --install /usr/bin/gcc gcc /usr/bin/gcc-5 100
sudo update-alternatives --install /usr/bin/gcc gcc /usr/bin/gcc-4.8 30
sudo update-alternatives --config g++ 
sudo update-alternatives --config gcc

Second step, in order to configure catkin_make for automatically compiling c++11, type in terminal as below:

sudo vim /opt/ros/<yourversion>/share/catkin/cmake/toplevel.cmake

insert this sentence at anywhere of toplevel.cmake

set(CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS "-std=c++11 ${CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS}")

5. /usr/include/boost/math/constants/constants.hpp:273:3: error: unable to find numeric literal operator ‘operator"" Q’. This is a requirement from LOAM package, see details in Same issue, type in terminal as below:

sudo vim /opt/ros/<yourversion>/share/catkin/cmake/toplevel.cmake

insert this sentence at anywhere of toplevel.cmake:

set(CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS "-std=gnu++11 ${CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS}")

If you follow the solution of issue 4, cover set(CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS "-std=c++11 ${CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS}") as set(CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS "-std=gnu++11 ${CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS}")