Converting Collada to urdf

Question

When running rosrun urdf check_urdf my_collada.dae, I get this error.

COLLADA error: Trying to load an invalid Collada version for this DOM build

I have looked at the source in collada_parser and urdf and cannot seem to find which version is required (I have tried 1.4.0 and 1.5.0)

I need to be publishing joints on /tf, so I want to convert my Collada file into an URDF, which robot_description requires as input.

Will this method work on a full-robot model with kinematic information, or would I have to convert each part to an urdf?

Here's a link to an example file that gives the error

Thanks

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Originally posted by phil0stine on ROS Answers with karma: 682 on 2012-08-18

Post score: 1

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Original comments

Comment by jbohren on 2012-08-19:
Can you post the model, or a similar one that gives you the same error?

Answer 1

Perhaps I am misunderstanding something, but as I see it you are testing a COLLADA format to see if it is URDF. They are two different formats. You can include a reference to a .dae file within a URDF file as a link, but .dae themselves are not URDF.

I would recommend you check out this excellent video on URDF from ROSCON http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g9WHxOpAUns

At 15:30 in the video you will see the format to include .dae into your URDF file. I've followed this, and it works perfectly. I have about 10 different mesh links in my URDF with no problems.

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Originally posted by dougbot01 with karma: 342 on 2012-08-19

This answer was ACCEPTED on the original site

Post score: 3

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Original comments

Comment by jbohren on 2012-08-20:
Except it's possible to load a COLLADA file and construct a C++ URDF object with this library: http://www.ros.org/wiki/collada_parser

Comment by phil0stine on 2012-08-20:
@jbohren Exactly, the ideal would be to support full kinematic chains, as mentioned here, but right now I am just going for a simple shape