This package allows to take manual control of the cameleon robot at any time. The package consist of two nodes. First node, named joy_node, reads data from joystick a sends them to the cameleon_teleop node, which processes the incoming data a sends them to Cameleon ROS driver. When the robot is not controlled manually, the cameleon_teleop simply receives commands over the cmd and flipperVelocity topics and passes them over to the cameleon/cmd_vel. When the operator presses manualOverrideButton (4 by default), the cmd and flipperVelocity messages are discarted and the operator can drive the robot manually.
To drive the robot manually, the operator has to keep the manualOverrideButton pressed. Then, the operator can set the robot forward acceleration (i.e. moving the joystick forwards and backwards causes the robot to increase or decrease speed), turning speed (i.e. moving the joystick sideways causes the robot to turn) and flipper speed (additional axis of the joystick can cause the flippers to move (counter-)clockwise.
To use this package:
- Install joystick package: sudo apt-get install ros-kinetic-joy
- Plug in your joystick and check which device it appears as, it should be something like ls /dev/input/jsX
- Use the jscal package to determine which axes you want to use to drive the robot.
- Edit the cameleon_teleop.launch file to set the proper device and axes.
- Run the cameleon_teleop.launch.