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Installing ROS 2 via Debian Packages
Table of Contents
Debian packages for ROS 2 Rolling Ridley are currently available for Ubuntu Focal. The Rolling Ridley distribution will change target platforms from time to time as new platforms are selected for development. The target platforms are defined in REP 2000 Most people will want to use a stable ROS distribution.
Set locale
Make sure you have a locale which supports UTF-8.
If you are in a minimal environment (such as a docker container), the locale may be something minimal like POSIX.
We test with the following settings. However, it should be fine if you’re using a different UTF-8 supported locale.
locale # check for UTF-8
sudo apt update && sudo apt install locales
sudo locale-gen en_US en_US.UTF-8
sudo update-locale LC_ALL=en_US.UTF-8 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
export LANG=en_US.UTF-8
locale # verify settings
Setup Sources
You will need to add the ROS 2 apt repository to your system. First, make sure that the Ubuntu Universe repository is enabled by checking the output of this command.
apt-cache policy | grep universe
500 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu focal/universe amd64 Packages
release v=20.04,o=Ubuntu,a=focal,n=focal,l=Ubuntu,c=universe,b=amd64
If you don’t see an output line like the one above, then enable the Universe repository with these instructions.
sudo apt install software-properties-common
sudo add-apt-repository universe
Now add the ROS 2 apt repository to your system. First authorize our GPG key with apt.
sudo apt update && sudo apt install curl gnupg lsb-release
sudo curl -sSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ros/rosdistro/master/ros.key -o /usr/share/keyrings/ros-archive-keyring.gpg
Then add the repository to your sources list.
echo "deb [arch=$(dpkg --print-architecture) signed-by=/usr/share/keyrings/ros-archive-keyring.gpg] http://packages.ros.org/ros2/ubuntu $(source /etc/os-release && echo $UBUNTU_CODENAME) main" | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/ros2.list > /dev/null
Install ROS 2 packages
Update your apt repository caches after setting up the repositories.
sudo apt update
Desktop Install (Recommended): ROS, RViz, demos, tutorials.
sudo apt install ros-rolling-desktop
ROS-Base Install (Bare Bones): Communication libraries, message packages, command line tools. No GUI tools.
sudo apt install ros-rolling-ros-base
Environment setup
Sourcing the setup script
Set up your environment by sourcing the following file.
source /opt/ros/rolling/setup.bash
Try some examples
If you installed ros-rolling-desktop above you can try some examples.
In one terminal, source the setup file and then run a C++ talker:
source /opt/ros/rolling/setup.bash
ros2 run demo_nodes_cpp talker
In another terminal source the setup file and then run a Python listener:
source /opt/ros/rolling/setup.bash
ros2 run demo_nodes_py listener
You should see the talker saying that it’s Publishing messages and the listener saying I heard those messages.
This verifies both the C++ and Python APIs are working properly.
Hooray!
Next steps after installing
Continue with the tutorials and demos to configure your environment, create your own workspace and packages, and learn ROS 2 core concepts.
Using the ROS 1 bridge
The ROS 1 bridge can connect topics from ROS 1 to ROS 2 and vice-versa. See the dedicated documentation on how to build and use the ROS 1 bridge.
Additional RMW implementations (optional)
The default middleware that ROS 2 uses is Cyclone DDS, but the middleware (RMW) can be replaced at runtime.
See the guide on how to work with multiple RMWs.
Troubleshooting
Troubleshooting techniques can be found here.