My Skill Lab
RoboticsIntermediate

Introduction to ROS

The framework real robots are built on.

Taught by Sristi Maharjan · Robotics Engineer

What you'll learn

  • Explain the ROS computation graph and how nodes, topics, messages, and services fit together
  • Inspect a running system with command-line tools like ros2 node, ros2 topic, and rqt_graph
  • Write and run a working publisher and subscriber in Python using rclpy
  • Create a ROS package, declare its dependencies, and start nodes with a launch file
  • Define and call a service to handle request/response interactions between nodes
  • Simulate and visualize a robot using Gazebo for physics and RViz for sensor data

About this course

The Robot Operating System (ROS) is the de facto middleware that powers research labs, startups, and production robots around the world. This hands-on course takes you from the core graph concepts of nodes, topics, and services through to building your own Python publisher/subscriber, organizing code into packages, and bringing robots to life in Gazebo and RViz. By the end you will read, run, and debug real ROS systems with confidence instead of copy-pasting commands you do not understand.

Course content

8 lessons
  1. 1What ROS Actually IsDemystify ROS as middleware and a computation graph rather than an operating system.Preview
  2. 2The Computation Graph: Nodes and TopicsLearn how nodes publish and subscribe to topics to form a running robot system.Preview
  3. 3Messages and InterfacesUnderstand message types, the .msg format, and how to inspect them.
  4. 4Your First Publisher and Subscriber in PythonWrite, run, and connect a rclpy publisher and subscriber node.
  5. 5Packages, Workspaces, and BuildingOrganize nodes into a package and build it with colcon in a workspace.
  6. 6Launch Files: Starting Many Nodes at OnceUse Python launch files to start and configure whole systems with one command.
  7. 7Services: Request and ResponseUse services for synchronous request/response calls between nodes.
  8. 8Simulation and Visualization: Gazebo and RVizSimulate robot physics in Gazebo and visualize live data in RViz.