Installation

Crazyswarm2 runs on Ubuntu Linux in one of the following configurations:

Ubuntu	Python	ROS 2
20.04	3.7, 3.8	Galactic
22.04	3.10	Humble

Warning

The Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) is experimentally supported but you’ll have to use usbipd-win. This program will link the crazyradio directly with WS, but beware of bugs. Check out their WSL connect guide.

Warning

Avoid using a virtual machine if possible: they add additional latency and might cause issues with the visualization tools.

First Installation

1. If needed, install ROS 2 using the instructions at https://docs.ros.org/en/galactic/Installation.html or https://docs.ros.org/en/humble/Installation.html.

2. Install dependencies

   sudo apt install libboost-program-options-dev libusb-1.0-0-dev
   pip3 install rowan
   

   If you are planning to use the CFlib backend, do:

   pip3 install cflib transforms3d
   sudo apt-get install ros-*DISTRO*-tf-transformations
   

3. Set up your ROS 2 workspace

   mkdir -p ros2_ws/src
   cd ros2_ws/src
   git clone https://github.com/IMRCLab/crazyswarm2 --recursive
   git clone --branch ros2 --recursive https://github.com/IMRCLab/motion_capture_tracking.git
   

4. Build your ROS 2 workspace

   cd ../
   colcon build --symlink-install
   

   Note

   symlink-install allows you to edit Python and config files without running colcon build every time.

5. Set up software-in-the-loop simulation (optional)

   This currently requires cloning the Crazyflie firmware and building the Python bindings manually. In a separate folder (not part of your ROS 2 workspace!),

   git clone --recursive https://github.com/bitcraze/crazyflie-firmware.git
   

   First follow the instructions to build the python bindings from the bitcraze website. Afterwards, make sure that the bindings can be found in the python path:

   export PYTHONPATH=<replace-with-path-to>/crazyflie-firmware/build:$PYTHONPATH
   

   If you are working from an older version of the crazyflie-firmware (before tag 2023.02), then you will need to point to main folder of the repo by removing the ‘/build’ part.

Updating

You can update your local copy using the following commands:

cd ros2_ws/src/crazyswarm2
git pull
git submodule sync
git submodule update --init --recursive
cd ../
colcon build --symlink-install