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Just a few notes on mechanical engineering and robotics

ROS2 vs ROS1 Overlay Workspace

July 8, 2021 by Abdur Rosyid

In ROS1, the structure of an overlay workspace, called the catkin workspace, looks like this:

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workspace_folder:
|--src
   |--CMakeLists.txt
   |--package_1_folder
   |--
   |--package_n_folder
|--devel
|--build
|--install

The catkin workspace is built by running “catkin_make” command. To rebuild a catkin workspace, simply delete all the folders inside the workspace but the “src” folder and subsequently run the “catkin_make” command.

For a detailed description, please consult the following documentation: http://wiki.ros.org/catkin/workspaces

In ROS2, the structure of an overlay workspace looks like this:

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workspace_folder:
|--src
   |--package_1_folder
   |--
   |--package_n_folder
|--build
   |--COLCON_IGNORE
   |--package_1_folder
   |--
   |--package_n_folder
|--install
   |--COLCON IGNORE
   |--files: setup.bash, local_setup.bash, etc
   |--package_1_folder
   |--
   |--package_n_folder
|--log

Building command

To build a ROS2 workspace, use the following command:

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colcon build --symlink-install

To rebuild a ROS2 workspace, simply delete all the folders inside the workspace but the “src” folder and subsequently perform the “colcon build” command.

If there are already a large number of packages inside your workspace, running the command above may take a long time to complete. Instead, you can only build the package(s) that has not been built yet by using the following command:

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colcon build --packages-select [PACKAGE_NAME]

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