Noob: how to animate a model
I have managed to get gazebo 2.2 (yah, yah, old hardware won't run new software) installed and running on my Ubuntu 14.04 system, and even loaded the "pioneer2dx" model as a proof of concept.
HOWEVER, I cannot for the life of me figure out how to get it to move around... Near the end of the beginners Make a Model tutorial the instructions are (paraphrased): Make sure the model you want to control is selected, then set Force (in the right hand view-window) and it should move -- also note, I think one must be sure that the Play button at the bottom is active, but this seems to make almost no difference (some of the pixels in the model shimmer when in Play not Pause).
Which tutorial and/or obvious step am I missing? Or is my hardware just not capable of motion? thanks!
Asked by schip666 on 2019-12-30 18:20:34 UTC
Answers
Which tutorial and/or obvious step am I missing?
That step would be to install a newer version 😬 Gazebo 2 has reached end of life several years ago and Ubuntu Trusty has reached end of standard support on April 2019, so it's really recommended that you upgrade your hardware 😕
Gazebo 2 doesn't have the force dialog that you're trying to use, as well as many important features throughout the tutorials.
is my hardware just not capable of motion?
You can definitely move robots in Gazebo 2, but you'll probably need to use APIs that were available back then. I don't think there were any GUI tools you could use to move the robot then.
Asked by chapulina on 2020-01-02 12:10:18 UTC
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Hi, thanks for the rather unsatisfying answer... I'm afraid the 'upgrade your hardware' option is not really available to me at this time.
However, I would take issue with the statement that G2 doesn't support the force dialog, as per this screen shot from: " Gazebo multi-robot simulator, version 2.2.3" -- https://drive.google.com/file/d/1_9pHEipiEydoLEF92gt9CiPOyggO8EAK/view?usp=sharing It just doesn't seem to do anything...
But, are there tutorials for animation somewhere?
Asked by schip666 on 2020-01-02 18:11:03 UTC
Sorry, I thought you meant the right-click-> Apply force dialog, which is only available from Gazebo 7. There's an animation tutorial here (from GAzebo 8), but I think what you want is to apply forces, not animate: http://gazebosim.org/tutorials?tut=actor&cat=build_robot
Asked by chapulina on 2020-01-02 19:01:58 UTC
Excellent. I will have a look. I'm really just trying to figure out if this software is appropriate for the project I have in mind before committing hours of noodling around. Maybe searching for "apply forces" will be more productive than "animation". Thanks for your help and happy new year!
Asked by schip666 on 2020-01-03 18:13:04 UTC
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