Where's the official Python API documentation for TF?

Question

The web article http://wiki.ros.org/tf only seems to point to the C++ API documentation (e.g. the following sub-article http://wiki.ros.org/tf/Overview/Data%20Types only contains C++ examples). I would like to use Python instead. I would like to read the official Python documentation for tf. Where can I find it?

In other ROS Wiki pages, there's usually the possibility to see both the Python and C++ version of the code or documentation. Why doesn't http://wiki.ros.org/tf provide such a duality?

I know there are a few tf tutorials (e.g. http://wiki.ros.org/tf/Tutorials/Writing%20a%20tf%20broadcaster%20%28Python%29) which use Python, but I would like to see all other examples and documentation in Python. There's this page http://mirror.umd.edu/roswiki/doc/diamondback/api/tf/html/python/tf_python.html, but it doesn't seem to be official.

I have also seen that there's also a new Python interface to the new tf library, i.e. to tf2, which is called tf2_ros. However, the documentation is pretty much empty. For example, the class TransformBroadcaster is not documented. Why? Why aren't people putting some effort on the documentation?

Furthermore, there's also the following article http://wiki.ros.org/tf/TfUsingPython, but there's no link from the web page http://wiki.ros.org/tf to it, besides being very poorly written and very incomplete.

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Originally posted by nbro on ROS Answers with karma: 372 on 2018-04-07

Post score: 0

Answer 1

All of the pages listed by @nbro are linked directly from the Package Links linkbox to the right of the Package Summary header on the tf2_ros wiki page:

which takes you to:

All ROS pkgs with (Doxygen) API docs should have those links.

You should not need to search docs.ros.org yourself (but you can, of course).

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Edit1: there is actually a tutorial about this: Navigating the ROS wiki.

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Originally posted by gvdhoorn with karma: 86574 on 2018-04-08

This answer was ACCEPTED on the original site

Post score: 3

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Original comments

Comment by nbro on 2018-04-10:
It's incredible I have never noticed "Code API" on that side of a ROS wiki article. If I am the only one who missed it, then shame on me, but if there are many other people in my situation, shame on the designers of the ROS wiki.

Comment by gvdhoorn on 2018-04-10:
"shame"? Really?

Comment by tfoote on 2018-04-10:
@gvdhoorn FYI I've given @nbro an official warning relating to this and a few other posts. https://github.com/ros/geometry/issues/161#issuecomment-380206764

Comment by gvdhoorn on 2018-04-10:
To be clear: I don't mind frank discussions and stating of opinions (I'm Dutch, I actually appreciate it). I do believe however that one needs to be careful not to come off as harsh or abrasive. This could just be a matter of the 'email effect', but expressions such as "shame on .." are a bit much.

Comment by nbro on 2018-04-12:
Yes, I understand that there may be a tutorial. My point is: there should not exist the need for a tutorial for such a basic functionality. Don't you also think?

Comment by gvdhoorn on 2018-04-12:
Every person is different. What may be apparent or intuitive to one could be opaque to another. I guess the tutorial / guide exists to explain how the wiki is layed out so that it becomes easier to find what you are looking for.

I can't comment on whether or not the current layout is bad or not, ..

Comment by gvdhoorn on 2018-04-12:
.. as I feel I'm too accustomed to all of this already to really have an objective opinion.

Comment by nbro on 2018-04-12:
There are fields like human-computer interaction (HCI) and user-experience design (UXD) which exist to solve this kind of problems.

Comment by gvdhoorn on 2018-04-12:
Certainly. Perhaps you know of a way to get them involved? This is largely a community based project, so improvements should really come from the community.

Comment by vschmidt on 2018-04-12:
This discussion seems to revolve around where the existing documentation can be found. But it doesn’t, in my opinion really address the original questions, which point to the fact that the existing documentation could use some work.

Comment by gvdhoorn on 2018-04-13:
I'm not sure: the title of the post by the OP is:

Where's the official Python API documentation for TF?

that does seem to ask for where it can be found.

Answer 2

Here's the official documentation for tf's Python API and here's the link for tf2's Python API documentation (both for Kinetic).

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The URL structure is

http://docs.ros.org/<ros-distro>/api/tf/html/python/tf_python.html

for tf and

http://docs.ros.org/<ros-distro>/api/tf2/html/

for tf2.

Just change the <ros-distro> portion of the URL to get your desired version of the docs.

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Originally posted by jayess with karma: 6155 on 2018-04-07

This answer was NOT ACCEPTED on the original site

Post score: 1

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Original comments

Comment by nbro on 2018-04-07:
@jayess The documentation exists for different ROS versions. I would encourage you to edit your answer and include the documentation for each ROS distribution and not just for kinetic (even though I added the tag only for kinetic, but apparently I can't add more tags).

Comment by nbro on 2018-04-07:
Note that the second template URL is equal to the first one!