Robot Upstart and USB Ports

Question

I'm currently trying to create a robot upstart package for my turtlebot 1.0. Seeing as how the minimal.launch relies on environment variables to launch the proper nodes for the turtlebot 1.0, I created a separate package in my workspace with the only purpose of having a launchfile for starting the turtlebot for the create base and kinect. The upstart package worked, and ros starts and so do all of the nodes, except the create isn't connected.

I think the problem is getting robot_upstart permission to use ttyUSB0. I created a udev rule to give permission to everyone, but I'm not sure if that's working? Has anybody faced a similar problem?

Thanks for any help or suggestions.

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Originally posted by Waron on ROS Answers with karma: 36 on 2016-01-26

Post score: 0

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Original comments

Comment by gvdhoorn on 2016-01-27:
Have you read the note about permissions set/used for the user robot_upstart uses? See The install script - permissions in the docs.

Comment by Waron on 2016-01-27:
I tried installing the job with the --user root option, but I still can't get it to connect. I tried setting udev rules and running as a variety of users. I did read the script, and I thought running as root or setting a udev is what they were indicated, but perhaps I'm misunderstanding something?

Comment by Peter Heim on 2016-01-27:
Can you post the udev rule and the part where you launch the turtlebot also dose the launch file work when you start manually

Comment by Waron on 2016-01-27:
For the udev rule, I made a file called "99-my-usb.rules" in /etc/udev/rules.d. The file contains the line: KERNEL=="ttyUSB[0-9]*,GROUP="uucp",MODE="0666"

I've also tried editing the rule for strictly USB0, with and without the GROUP, but always keeping the mode 666.

Comment by Waron on 2016-01-27:
As for the launch file, it works perfectly when manually launched. All it does is call the turtlebot minimal.launch file with the parameters for my turtlebot 1.0.

Answer 1

What version of ROS are you using and have you checked the log for errors??

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Originally posted by Peter Heim with karma: 215 on 2016-01-27

This answer was ACCEPTED on the original site

Post score: 0

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Original comments

Comment by Waron on 2016-01-27:
I'm using Indigo. I checked the logs but I can't seem to find any errors relating to inability to connect. Usually when the create is unable to connect it gives an error indicating SCI can't connect, but here I'm not getting anything.

Comment by Waron on 2016-01-27:
I lied! The console is showing warnings "Create : robot not connected yet, sci not available" when robot_upstart calls the launchfile.

Comment by Peter Heim on 2016-01-27:
I'm not familiar with sic but i would check its permissions as a start, look for env variables i think upstart runs as a different user

Comment by Waron on 2016-01-27:
So, I've been able to confirm now that my udev rules are working, and I'm able to give ttyUSB0 permissions to the "users" group, which should cover even the unprivileged users ran by setuidgid program which calls the launchfile. I still get error messages that the create isn't connect however. :(

Comment by Waron on 2016-01-27:
also, the sci is just the serial interface it uses... when I run the launchfile on its own, and I've chowned ttyUSB0 prior, it connects just fine and everything works.

Comment by Peter Heim on 2016-01-28:
are you using udev to change permissions for USB0? I use symlink as so SUBSYSTEMS=="usb", KERNEL=="ttyUSB[0-9]*", ATTRS{idVendor}=="0403", ATTRS{idProduct}=="6001", SYMLINK+="sensors/ftdi_%s{serial}"