Set up the ROS 2 environment

Prerequisites: Ubuntu 22.04 for the Humble reference setup, installed GTA, and access to the workcell’s ROS workspace. Outcome: the same Python interpreter used by GTA can import the ROS/device packages it needs.

1. Install and source ROS

Follow the official ROS 2 Humble installation guide. Then source ROS and your actual robot/camera workspace in the terminal that will launch GTA:

source /opt/ros/humble/setup.bash
# Replace this with the real workspace path:
source /path/to/robot_ws/install/setup.bash

Replace /path/to/robot_ws with your robot/camera workspace path.

2. Keep Python and ROS compatible

Humble’s Ubuntu binary Python packages target the system Python 3.10 environment. A separate Conda interpreter or mismatched native libraries can import part of ROS successfully and still fail when creating an executor.

Use a compatible Python 3.10 environment with access to sourced packages. When creating a dedicated hardware environment, --system-site-packages can expose required system Python packages:

python3.10 -m venv --system-site-packages .venv
source .venv/bin/activate
python -m pip install -r requirements.txt

Reuse an existing compatible environment if you have one. Install ROS and message packages through the ROS installation, and follow the vendor/RTDE instructions for device dependencies.

3. Select middleware

GTA_BACKEND=ros2
CAMERA_BACKEND=ros2
ROBOT_TYPE=ur5e
GRIPPER_TYPE=robotiq

All participating ROS processes must use compatible DDS/domain/network settings. ROS_DOMAIN_ID belongs to the sourced process environment; GTA does not force a domain. Use the same value for camera, gripper, and GTA terminals. Source the environment before launching either dashboard: child processes inherit it.

4. Run read-only environment checks

python -c "import sys; print(sys.executable); print(sys.version)"
python -c "import rclpy, sensor_msgs, std_msgs, control_msgs, action_msgs; print(rclpy.__file__)"
python -c "import rtde_control, rtde_receive; print('RTDE imports available')"
printenv ROS_DISTRO ROS_DOMAIN_ID
ros2 node list
ros2 topic list
ros2 action list -t

Continue with robot and gripper checks to verify device endpoints.

For motion control, GTA starts its server with the application’s Python interpreter and inherited sourced environment.

Verify: Python resolves the intended modules and the expected external camera/gripper endpoints are visible. For import or environment errors, see environment troubleshooting.