Documentation of lpzrobots

0.5

Organization:: University Leipzig
Institute for Computer Science
Dept. Intelligent Systems
Prof. Dr. Ralf Der
Research Group: Neuroinformatics und Robotic
and
Max-Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-organzation
Bernsteincenter for Computational Neuroscience Goettingen
Bunsenstr.10, 37073 Goettingen, Germany
Georg Martius
Research Group: Self-organization in Adaptive Systems

People:: Georg Martius, Ralf Der, Frank Hesse, Frank Güttler, Jörn Hoffmann
Former Contributors: Marcel Kretschmann, Dominic Schneider, Claus Stadler,

General

This is a collection of algorithms, simulations, and tools developed by the Robotics Group for Self-Organization of Control (http://robot.informatik.uni-leipzig.de).
It consists of the following directories (click for details):

selforg : controllers together with a small framework for using them, developed in the robotic group of Leipzig university yielding at self-organized behaviour for various kinds of machines.
ode_robots : physics simulator based on ODE (Open Dynamics Engine, see http://www.ode.org). This includes such as robots, obstacles, utils, stuff for visualization with OSG (OpenSceneGraph, see http://www.openscenegraph.org) and so on.
ga_tools : genetic algorithms framework that can be used to together with ode_robots or for independent simulations
guilogger : application that coordinates multiple gnuplot windows and allows for an interactive display of data that is sent per pipe from another program
neuronviz : application that displays neural networks
webots : directory with a webots simulation using the selforg lib
opende : directory with a snapshot of the open dynamics engine (release 0.9) (please follow the link for installation hints)

Requirements

You need the following software and libraries installed (Tested on Linux x86 and MAC Leopard).

ODE see http://www.ode.org which is now in the opende directory (please follow the instrutions printed by the Makefile in lpzrobots)
OpenSceneGraph http://www.openscenegraph.org (version >= 2.2.0)
(optional) Qt library from http://www.trolltech.com for guilogger (version > 4.0)
- make sure you install the devel packages
- make sure the correct version of qmake is in your path. If you have both qt3 and qt4 installed you have to take care of that. Use qmake --version to find out. On Debian and Ubuntu use the alternatives system http://www.debian-administration.org/articles/91
(optional) Java JDK for neuronviz (version >= J2SE 1.5.0)

Linux

For convinience we provide a binary package with ODE and OSG compatible with most linux distributions, see next section

MAC

We recommend to install the ODE and OSG via macports (http://www.macports.org) (after installation of macports type on a console sudo port install osg OpenSceneGraph)

Installation & Startup

You have tree different ways to get the simulator to work.

A) Download a binary version of the simulator and the utilities. This is the quick 'n' easy way which does not require root permissions, see Way A: Binary installation
B) Use an .rpm or .deb package if possible. This is easiest way but requires root permissions, see Way B: Package installation.
C) Download the source tar ball and compile the simulator youself. You have still the chance to take the precompiled extra libs. If way A and B fails or you want to modify the simulator then this is the way to go, see Way C: Installation from source

Way A: Binary installation

Download the binary and maybe the extra-lib tar balls from http://robot.informatik.uni-leipzig.de/software .
Unpack the files (with tar -xvzf file.tgz)
Install extra libs (ODE >= 0.8 and OSG > 2.2)
- Check first whether you can get packages for your distribution. Make sure you get the development version (-devel or -dev).
- debian/ubuntu name: libopenscenegraph-dev, libode0-dev
- if there are none then install the extra libs from us as described below or follow the appropriate part of Way C: Installation from source.
```
cd lpzrobots-0.*-extra-lib-devel*
sudo ./install.sh
```
  The files are stored under /usr/local/.

Install the simulator:

cd lpzrobots-0.*-binary-lib-devel*
make install
# or, if you want a system wide installation
sudo make install

Now you are done with the installation and you can try a sample simulation. There are located in the ode_robots/simulations/ folder and are also copied to /usr/local/share/lpzrobots/. Please continue reading in section Run example Simulations.

Way B: Package installation

Download a package that fits your system from http://robot.informatik.uni-leipzig.de/software and use the package manager of your linux distribution. (Mostly automatically opens when downloading the package)
Just in case for rpm-based system (Redhat,SuSe):
```
su
rpm -i lpzrobots-0.X...rpm
```
On Debian-based systems (e.g. also Ubuntu):
```
sudo dpkg -i lpzrobots-0.X...deb
```
Now you can copy the sample simulations from /usr/local/share/lpzrobots/ to your home directory and continue reading in section Run example Simulations.

Way C: Installation from source

Download source tar ball from http://robot.informatik.uni-leipzig.de/software .
Unpack file.
Change into lpzrobots directory
Call make to get a help display and continue with make prepare, which will do the following:
- it creates a configuration makefile (Makefile.conf) with your interaction
- it compiles neuronviz (not strictly necessary, only for displaying neuronal network online)
- it compiles guilogger (not strictly necessary, only for displaying parameters online (recommended))
- Please note, that the make call will not fail if either of them failed to compile, because they are optional. You can type make guilogger and make neuronviz to compile them separately.
- it creates dependency files and creates links to header files, such that thay are found.
- it prints some information how to install the ODE residing in the opende directory.
Now you have to install the extra libs namely ODE and OSG.
- To install the ODE please follow the instructions printed by the makefile. If nothing is printed then the libode was found. In case it is not the correct version do the following:
```
cd opende 
sh autogen.sh
./configure --enable-release --enable-double-precision
make
sudo make install
```
- To install the OSG, please refere to their homepage: http://www.openscenegraph.org/
After finishing the installation of ODE and OSG you can procede with the installtion of th simulator.

Call in the directory lpzrobots/

make libs
make install
# or, if you want a system wide installation
sudo make install

This will compile the libaries and install the tools.

Now you are done with the installation and you can try a sample simulation see next section.

Run example Simulations

Simulations are located in ode_robots/simulations/,ode_robots/examples/, and selforg/simulations/. This folders you can find in the lpzrobots tar files or if installed on your system under /usr/local/share/lpzrobots. In the latter case copy the simulations to your home directory first.
To start a simulation go into a simulation directory.
If you installed from source you have to call make.
You can start the simulation by ./start.

For example when you want to start the template_sphererobot simulation type:

cd ode_robots/simulations/template_sphererobot
make # if installed from source
./start

for optimisation you can also use make opt which produces and start_opt(might need a make clean before). This is very recommended to use after testing the code.

The following command line options are available (type ./start -h for a full list of options):

Usage: ./start [-g [interval]] [-f [interval]] [-r seed] [-x WxH] [-fs]
                 [-pause] [-shadow N] [-noshadow] [-drawboundings] [-simtime [min]] [-threads N]
                 [-odethread] [-osgthread] [-savecfg]
        -g interval     use guilogger (default interval 1)
        -f interval     write logging file (default interval 5)
        -n interval     use neuronviz (default interval 10)
        -s "-disc|ampl|freq val"        use soundMan
        -r seed         random number seed
        -x WxH          * window size of width(W) x height(H) is used (default 640x480)
        -fs             fullscreen mode
        -pause          start in pause mode
        -nographics             start without any graphics
        -noshadow       disables shadows and shaders (same as -shadow 0)
        -shadow [0..5]]         * sets the type of the shadow to be used
                        0: no shadow, 1: ShadowVolume, 2: ShadowTextue, 3: ParallelSplitShadowMap
                        4: SoftShadowMap, 5: ShadowMap (default)
        -shadowsize size        * sets the size of the shadow texture (default 2048)
        -drawboundings  enables the drawing of the bounding shapes of the meshes
        -simtime min    limited simulation time in minutes
        -savecfg        safe the configuration file with the values given by the cmd line
        -threads N      number of threads to use (default is the number of processors)
        -odethread      * if given the ODE runs in its own thread. -> Sensors are delayed by 1
        -osgthread      * if given the OSG runs in its own thread (recommended)
        * this parameter can be set in the configuration file ~/.lpzrobots/ode_robots.cfg

Have a look at the console after starting the program, there you will find some further information for the usage of the program.
E. g. with Ctrl+C (on the terminal) you get a interactive console interface which can be used to modify parameters on the fly.
For starting your own simulation see paragraph "How to Start Your Own Simulation" in ode_robots.
For a well documented examples of a main.cpp of a simulation and a robot .cpp file click the tab "Examples" at the top of this page.

Documentation

This manual can be found at http://robot.informatik.uni-leipzig.de/software
More informations on the used self-organization algorithm is available at http://robot.informatik.uni-leipzig.de/research
An ODE tutorial by Marcel Kretschmann can be found at http://robot.informatik.uni-leipzig.de/students
However, the simulator builds a small layer on top of ODE so that you should better look at the existing robots to find out how it works. (Tar ball with pdf and example code also there available.)
The original ODE documentation can be found at http://www.ode.org/ode-docs.html
The OSG documentation can be found at http://www.openscenegraph.org/projects/osg/wiki/Support

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