eCAL ROS2 middleware layer

ROS2 middleware based on eCAL.

eCAL RMW can offer:

• High performance (shared memory is used for inter-process communication and udp multicast for inter-host communication)
• Support for eCAL ecosystem powerful tools like eCAL recorder, eCAL player, eCAL monitor, which can be used to record, replay and monitor RMW layer
• Communication between ROS2 nodes and eCAL tasks without need for a gateway

Build instructions

• Install eCAL
• Clone latest release of this repository into your ROS2 workspace
• Source ROS2

# On Linux
source /path/to/your/ros/distro/folder/setup.bash
# On Windows
call C:/path/to/your/ros/distro/folder/setup.bat

• Run colcon build from your workspace folder
• Setup your workspace

# On Linux
source /path/to/your/workspace/install/setup.bash
# On Windows
call C:/path/to/your/workspace/install/setup.bat

How to use

There are currently two rmw implementations

• rmw_ecal_dynamic_cpp
• rmw_ecal_proto_cpp

rmw_ecal_dynamic_cpp

rmw_ecal_dynamic_cpp uses custom dynamic typesupport which is builtin into rmw.
To use this implementation just set variable RMW_IMPLEMENTATION to "rmw_ecal_dynamic_cpp".

Run all nodes using rmw_ecal_dynamic_cpp

# On Linux
export RMW_IMPLEMENTATION=rmw_ecal_dynamic_cpp
# On Windows
set RMW_IMPLEMENTATION=rmw_ecal_dynamic_cpp

Run specific node (in this example demo_nodes_cpp talker) using

RMW_IMPLEMENTATION=rmw_ecal_dynamic_cpp ros2 run demo_nodes_cpp talker

Pros:

• Faster than rmw_ecal_proto_cpp
• Plug&Play doesn't require any additional steps/ros packages to work

Cons:

• Doesn't integrate well into eCAL ecosystem (monitor will only show binary data for messages and native eCAL nodes won't be able to deserialize its data)

rmw_ecal_proto_cpp

rmw_ecal_proto_cpp uses protobuf based static typesupport.
To use this implementation setup rosidl_typesupport_protobuf and set variable RMW_IMPLEMENTATION to "rmw_ecal_proto_cpp".

Run all nodes using rmw_ecal_proto_cpp

# On Linux
export RMW_IMPLEMENTATION=rmw_ecal_proto_cpp
# On Windows
set RMW_IMPLEMENTATION=rmw_ecal_proto_cpp

Run specific node (in this example demo_nodes_cpp talker) using

RMW_IMPLEMENTATION=rmw_ecal_proto_cpp ros2 run demo_nodes_cpp talker

Pros:

• Integrates well into eCAL ecosystem (monitor will show actual message data and native eCAL nodes will be able to deserialize its messages)

Cons:

• A bit slower than rmw_ecal_dynamic_cpp
• Not plug&play, requires rosidl_typesupport_protobuf to be built and sourced to work

Currently supported ROS2 distributions

• Dashing Diademata
• Eloquent Elusor
• Foxy Fitzroy
• Galactic Geochelone