Autoware.Auto
Installation

Table of Contents

Goals

This article demonstrates how to use the Agile Development Environment (ADE) to develop Autoware.Auto applications.

Install ADE

ADE is a modular Docker-based tool to ensure that all developers in a project have a common, consistent development environment.

Follow the install instructions, which are reproduced here for convenience:

  1. Verify that the requirements listed here are fulfilled
  1. Download the statically-linked binary from the Releases page of the ade-cli project
  1. Name the binary ade and install it in your PATH (on Ubuntu, /usr/local/bin is recommended)
  1. Make the binary executable: chmod +x ade
  1. Check that it is installed:
$ which ade
/path/to/ade
$ ade --version
<version>

Setup ADE home and project checkout

ADE needs a directory on the host machine which is mounted as the user's home directory within the container. The directory is populated with dotfiles, and must be different than the user's home directory outside of the container. In the event ADE is used for multiple, projects it is recommended to use dedicated adehome directories for each project.

ADE looks for a directory containing a file named .adehome starting with the current working directory and continuing with the parent directories to identify the ADE home directory to be mounted.

$ mkdir adehome
$ cd adehome
$ touch .adehome

For ADE to function, it must be properly configured. Autoware.Auto provides an .aderc file which is expected to exist in the current working directory, or in any parent directory. Additionally, default configuration values can be overridden by setting environment variables. See the ade --help output for more information about using environment variables to define the configuration.

$ cd adehome
$ git clone https://gitlab.com/autowarefoundation/autoware.auto/AutowareAuto.git

How to build

$ ade start --update --enter
ade$ cd AutowareAuto
ade$ vcs import < autoware.auto.$ROS_DISTRO.repos
ade$ colcon build
ade$ colcon test
ade$ colcon test-result

Choosing a DDS Vendor

Choosing a DDS vendor is usually as simple as changing the RMW_IMPLEMENTATION environment variable. This can either be done by changing the value that is added to the .aderc file in the ADE_DOCKER_RUN_ARGS or by overriding it manually using the commands below. For more information about why you would want to use a different DDS vendor and which ones are available, see this ROS Index article. For more information about working with multiple middleware (DDS) implementations, see this ROS Index article.

For Cyclone DDS (the default in `ade`):

ade$ export RMW_IMPLEMENTATION=rmw_cyclonedds_cpp

## For FastRTPS (now FastDDS - the default in ROS Dashing):

ade$ export RMW_IMPLEMENTATION=rmw_fastrtps_cpp

## For Connext (not installed to ade by default):

ade$ sudo apt-get install rti-connext-dds-5.3.1 ros-dashing-rmw-connext-cpp
ade$ export RMW_IMPLEMENTATION=rmw_connext_cpp

## For GurumDDS (not installed to ade by default):

ade$ sudo apt-get install gurumdds-2.6 ros-dashing-rmw-gurumdds-cpp
ade$ export RMW_IMPLEMENTATION=rmw_gurumdds_cpp

Cleanup

ADE uses Docker, and over time unused images, containers, and volumes begin to clutter the hard drive. Follow the steps below to clean the Docker filesytem of stale images.

Start relevant Docker resources

First, verify that ADE is running:

$ cd adehome/AutowareAuto
$ ade start

If ADE is used for more than one project, verify all ADE instances are running; the same rule applies for any other non-ADE Docker containers that should be preserved.

Note
Docker resources that are not started/running will be removed!

Docker disk usage

To assess the disk usage situation, run the following command:

$ docker system df
TYPE TOTAL ACTIVE SIZE RECLAIMABLE
Images 13 11 14.03GB 916.9MB (6%)
Containers 11 0 2.311MB 2.311MB (100%)
Local Volumes 17 15 5.411GB 17.8MB (0%)
Build Cache 0 0 0B 0B

Remove unused docker items

Use docker system prune to remove unused Docker items:

$ docker system prune -a --volumes