Skip to content

Sensing launch files#

Overview#

The Autoware sensing stack starts with autoware.launch.xml, as the Launch Autoware page explains. If launch_sensing is true, autoware.launch.xml includes component_sensing.launch.xml of the autoware_launch package. This file includes sensing.launch.xml of your sensor kit launch package, <sensor_model>_launch, in the /sensing namespace. The following diagram shows the sensing launch flow with sample_sensor_kit_launch.

autoware.launch.xml includes component_sensing.launch.xml, which includes sensing.launch.xml of the sensor kit launch package. In sample_sensor_kit_launch, sensing.launch.xml includes the LiDAR, IMU, and GNSS launch files and the vehicle velocity converter. For each LiDAR, lidar.launch.xml includes a container, the driver, and the preprocessor. Then it concatenates the point clouds.autoware.launch.xmlautoware_launchcomponent_sensing.launch.xmlautoware_launchPasses launch_sensing_driver as launch_driver,and the mirror.param.yaml file of the vehicleNamespace /sensingsensing.launch.xml<sensor_model>_launchFor example sample_sensor_kit_launchlidar.launch.xml<sensor_model>_launchFor each LiDAR: top, left, right, rearpointcloud_container.launch.xmlautoware_sensing_launchvelodyne_VLS128.launch.xml, velodyne_VLP16.launch.xmlautoware_sensor_driver_launch: the Nebula driverpointcloud_preprocessor_cpu.launch.xmlautoware_sensing_launchpointcloud_concatenation_cpu.launch.xmlautoware_sensing_launch: concatenates the point cloudscamera.launch.xml<sensor_model>_launchThe sample sensor kit has this file, but sensing.launch.xml does not include it.imu.launch.xml<sensor_model>_launchtag_serial_drivertamagawa_imu_driver node: commented out in the sampleimu_corrector.launch.xmlautoware_imu_correctorgyro_bias_estimator.launch.xmlautoware_imu_correctorgnss.launch.xml<sensor_model>_launchGNSS driver: ublox_gps or septentrio_gnss_driverSelected by gnss_receiver, if launch_driver is truegnss_poser.launch.xmlautoware_gnss_poservehicle_velocity_converter.launch.xmlautoware_vehicle_velocity_converterConverts /vehicle/status/velocity_status into/sensing/vehicle_velocity_converter/twist_with_covarianceThe files of the sensor kit come from sample_sensor_kit_launch. Your sensor kit can include other files.launch_sensing:=true
component_sensing.launch.xml includes sensing.launch.xml of the sensor kit, which includes the launch files of each sensor type.

Note

The Autoware project is a large project. Therefore, as we manage the Autoware project, we utilize specific arguments in the launch files. ROS 2 offers an argument-overriding feature for these launch files. Please refer to the official ROS 2 launch documentation for further information. For instance, if we define an argument at the top-level launch, it will override the value on lower-level launches.

The sensor kit launch package holds the sensing pipeline of your vehicle. It uses the shared launch files of two packages:

The sensing launch depends on your sensor kit. So, to change the sensing launch, change your <YOUR-SENSOR-KIT>_launch package. For more information, see the creating sensor and vehicle model pages. You can also change some things in the top-level launch files.

For example, if you do not want to launch the sensor drivers with Autoware, disable them with a command-line argument:

ros2 launch autoware_launch autoware.launch.xml ... launch_sensing_driver:=false ...

Or you can change it in your autoware.launch.xml launch file:

- <arg name="launch_sensing_driver" default="true" description="launch sensing driver"/>
+ <arg name="launch_sensing_driver" default="false" description="launch sensing driver"/>

component_sensing.launch.xml gives this value to sensing.launch.xml as launch_driver. In sample_sensor_kit_launch, launch_driver:=false stops the GNSS driver and the Velodyne monitor, and the Nebula LiDAR drivers do not connect to the sensors. The IMU driver node of the sample is commented out, so you add your own IMU driver to imu.launch.xml. The preprocessing still runs. You can use this, for example, to replay the sensor data of a rosbag.