Vizanti - Web Visualizer & Mission Planner for ROS

Vizanti is a web-based visualization and control tool developed for more convenient operation of outdoor robots running the Robot Operating System (ROS). The application attempts to replicate RViz's orthographic 2D view as closely as possible with a smartphone friendly interface. The second goal is to allow planning and executing movement and mission commands, i.e. goals and waypoints, with custom buttons and parameter reconfigure.

Installation

As a field tool, Vizanti is designed to operate just as well without internet access, and as such the intended way is to host it on a robot, with rosbridge autoconnecting to the host IP.

cd ~/catkin_ws/src
git clone https://github.com/MoffKalast/vizanti.git
cd ..
rosdep install --from-paths src --ignore-src
catkin_make

Or if rosdep fails for some reason, these are the main two deps:

sudo apt install ros-noetic-rosbridge-suite python3-flask

Flask and Jinja2 are used for templating, rosbridge is required for socket communication.

Run

roslaunch vizanti server.launch

The web app can be accessed at http://<host_ip>:5000. Client settings are automatically saved in localStorage. The satelite imagery renderer also uses the indexedDB to store tiles for offline use (note that this is IP specific). By default the rosbridge instance also occupies port 5001.

If you're using a mobile device connected to a robot's hotspot that doesn't have internet access, make sure to turn off mobile data. This will prevent Android from sending packets to the wrong gateway.

Note that the client uses the web fetch API to load a fair few things, make sure your browser is at least somewhat up to date or some features may not work.

Feature list

Aside from the required ones, custom widgets can be added to the navbar to customize functionality for a given robot and test setup.

Note: Some icons open setup modals instantly, while others use a single press to trigger actions and use a long press to open the modal.

General Tools & Configuration

#### Global Settings Set the background color and the fixed TF frame. Also has a button to reset the camera view to zero and default zoom. #### Grid The adjustable metric grid. Currently renders only in the fixed frame. #### TF Renders TF frames, same options as in RViz for the most part. #### Robot Model Renders a 2D sprite to represent the robot model or any specific TF link. #### Dynamic Reconfigure Adjust configurations of all nodes supporting dynamic reconfigure params. Currently rather slow to load and update, but will make sure parameters are current. It treats ints as floats due to type autodetection problems. #### Bag Recorder Recording specified topics by calling rosbag record via proxy. #### Node Manager See info printouts of a specific node, kill nodes, launch nodes, that sort of thing. #### Add new visualizer/widget Self explanatory.

Mission Planning

#### Teleop Joystick Joystick used for publishing Twist messages, can be positioned anywhere on the screen and switched into holonomic mode. #### 2D Pose Estimate Send the /initialpose for navigation startup. Long press to open setup menu. #### 2D Nav Goal Send a /move_base_simple/goal. Long press to open setup menu. #### Waypoint Mission Create missions with multiple waypoints, then send them as a Path message. Single tap to add a point, single tap to remove an existing one, hold and drag to move points. Adding a point on an existing line will add it between those two points. Long press to open setup menu. #### Area Mission Drag to select an area and publish it to a PolygonStamped topic. Since the area is a rectangle, the first polygon vertex will be at the cursor press, and the third vertex will be the press released point. Long press to open setup menu. #### Button A button with customizable text that displays the last message sent on a Bool topic and sends the inverse to toggle it when pressed. Also supports just sending messages to an Empty topic. Long press to open setup menu.

Data Visualization

#### Map Display an OccupancyGrid. Also has some experimental map_server controls for saving and loading maps. #### Satellite Tiles Display satelite imagery, by default from OpenStreetMap. Requires a Fix origin with the correct frame in its header. #### Battery Display a BatteryState message. #### Compressed Image Display a CompressedImage message in a movable box anywhere on the screen. Heavily throttled by default. #### Marker Array Visualize a MarkerArray. Currently supported types are ARROW, CUBE, SPHERE, CYLIDER, LINE_STRIP and TEXT_VIEW_FACING. Since each of these widgets adds another canvas layer, it makes more sense to aggregate regular Marker messages into a Marker Array to avoid some of that overhead. #### Path Render a Path message for navigation debugging. #### Range Render a Range message on the main view. Supports grouping multiple messages onto the same topic, as long as the tf frames are different. #### Laser Scan Display a LaserScan message on the main view. Heavily throttled by default. #### Point Cloud Display a PointCloud2 message on the main view. Heavily throttled by default. #### Pose with Covariance (Stamped) Display a PoseWithCovarianceStamped message. The covariance rendering is currently experimental and will likely only display correctly for spherical covariance. #### Pose Array Display a PoseArray message. Throttled to 15 hz. #### Temperature Display a Temperature message. Only as a widget for now, not on the view itself.

Contributing

Please see Contributing.md for more information.