/SUAS-Installs-2022

Instructions and scripts for installing 'stuff' for SUAS

Primary LanguageShell

SUAS-Installs (2022-2023)

Instructions and scripts for installing 'stuff' for SUAS



Python3.9

Install python3.9 on Linux (Ubuntu)

Run the following script in terminal

sudo apt install python3

Install python3.9 on Windows

Go to https://www.python.org/downloads/, then download and install python 3.9.13.

i.e.

  1. Look for python 3.9.13
  2. click download
  3. choose the installer that matches your machine specs
  4. download it
  5. run installation
  6. complete installation.

Install python3.9 on MacOS

Install homebrew (the package manager, not a coffee preparation heuristic) by running the following script in your terminal

/bin/bash -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/HEAD/install.sh)"

Then, restart your terminal and run the following script

brew install python3
brew install pyenv
pyenv install 3.9.13



Gazebo (recommended for testing)

Gazebo is the 3D visualization software we will be using for our simulations. This runs on an Ubuntu environment, so install it on your VM or WSL environment.

To install use the provided script

./gazebo_install.sh

You can then start Gazebo with an empty world using

gazebo --verbose

NOTE: if you are using WSL2 on Windows10, you must have Xsrv running to see the Gazebo GUI

To use Gazebo for testing, follow the Wiki page link TDB or the DroneKit workshop tutorial



Clone UAS SUAS-flight-2023 repository

When we write code, we want to

  1. share it with others
  2. keep track of old version of the code

To do this, we use Git, a version control software. Through Git, we use a repository to hold the code for a single project.

Clone (download) our flight 2023 repository by doing the following

git clone https://github.com/uas-at-ucla/suas-flight-2023.git
cd suas-flight-2023

This will create a new folder called suas-flight-2023 and changes directory to it. This is where all the development for our flight software will be kept.



Python Virtual Environment

NOTE: This is not required for the SUAS-Installs repo, but will be needed to setup SUAS-flight later. For now, consider this as practice.

To manage our Python libraries, we use Pip3. However, we also want a program to isolate our workspaces so we don't use include packages from other workspaces. The solution to this is a Python virtual environment (venv).

Create the virtual environment

To create a Python virtual environment, do

python -m venv venv

which creates a virtual environment folder called 'venv'.

Activating the virtual environment

To activate a Python virtual environment, do

source ./venv/bin/activate

which runs the activation script. Your lines in the terminal should now start with '(venv)'.

Installing required packages

To install required packages, do

pip3 install -r requirements.txt

which installs all the packages from requirements.txt into the virtual environment. This allows us to document the packages we are using for this specific workspace.



VSCode (recommended)

Now that we have all the frameworks and packages we want to use, we need a place to actually write CODE. For this, we use a type of software called an Integrate Development Environment or IDE for short. This is basically a fancy text editor made specifically to write code. We recommend using VSCode for our projects. VSCode allows for a lot of customization and sharing them.

You can find VSCode here

TBD: VSCode extension and configuration

Windows Terminal (recommended)

Windows terminal is Microsoft's terminal application. It allows you to run any terminal instance (wsl2, cygwin, putty, powershell, command line, etc.) from the same program. It's also highly customizable. Highly recommend for Windows users!!





Likely Obfuscated - for Fixed Plane only?

ArduPlane

ArduPlane is a version of PX4's simulation software used in order to visualize the drone flying while you work on your code / sub-project. The downside is that you may only be able to run this on a ubuntu machine (or, in the case of windows, using WSL2 / Cygwin). Therefore, either a virtual machine must be installed on your system, or a sub-system os (such as cygwin, wsl2, etc.) must be running on your device in order for you to install this software. Once this is available, follow the following steps to complete the installation.

  1. Open your linux terminal (either wsl2, cygwin, or your terminal in your virtual machine)
  2. Run the provided ubuntu_arduplane_install.sh script in the terminal, using the following command: 
    bash ubuntu_arduplane_install.sh
    • If you're running wsl2, you should be able to navigate to the folder where this file is using cd, then run the script.
    • For virtual machine users, it may be easier to either open the script, and copy the contents into your terminal, and run each line individually. Or, for the brave of heart,
      1. Install git on the linux installation using the terminal using the following command 
        sudo apt install git
      2. Clone this repo in the virtual machine, using the following command 
        git clone https://github.com/uas-at-ucla/SUAS-Installs.git
      3. Run the following to go into the directory, and run the installer. 
        cd SUAS-Installs
bash ubuntu_arduplane_install.sh

NOTE: This installation takes A WHILE.



VcXsrv

NOTE: Needed for WSL2 on Windows 10 ONLY

The ArduPlane simulator will run on WSL, but to access the graphical simulation, we need to tell WSL to port the graphics to the Windows host system. To do this, we use an VcXsrv server to receive the graphics.

NOTE: install this on your Windows host system, i.e. not through WSL

To install VcXsrv, follow the instructions here

This will create a program called XLaunch which will launch the VcXsrv server.

To set the needed window parameter correctly, and run XLaunch

Run the following lines to the end of your ~/.bashrc file using wsl2

export DISPLAY=$(ip route list default | awk '{print $3}'):0
export LIBGL_ALWAYS_INDIRECT=1

Or run the following script in WSL

./Xwindows.sh

which will automatically add in the DISPLAY and LIBGL_ALWAYS_INDIRECT variable lines

Then run XLaunch. While running, simply keep the default settings at all pages except the second-to-last one. Here, make sure to check the "disable access control" box. Then, finish the run.