ROS Programming: Building Powerful Robots

The demo mode

We can do the whole pick and place task without perception in demo mode, that is, without actually actuating on the Gazebo simulation, or the real robotic arm. In this mode, we will use fake controllers to move the arm once the motion plan has been found by MoveIt! to do the pick and place actions, including grasping the object. The same code can be used directly on the actual controllers.

In order to run pick and place in the demo mode, run the following commands:

    $ roslaunch rosbook_arm_moveit_config demo.launch
    $ roslaunch rosbook_arm_pick_and_place grasp_generator_server.launch
    $ rosrunros book_arm_pick_and_place pick_and_place.py  

The special part is the first launch file, which simply opens RViz and loads fake controllers ...