ROS Driver for Bitcraze Crazyflie (http://www.bitcraze.se/), with the following features:

• Uses the official python SDK (which needs to be installed/copied separately)
• Publishes on-board sensors in ROS standard message formats
• Supports ROS parameters to reconfigure crazyflie parameters

Clone the package into your catkin workspace:

git clone https://github.com/whoenig/crazyflie_ros.git

Additionally, you should have the bitcraze SDK on your file system. See https://github.com/bitcraze/crazyflie-clients-python for details.

If you want to use joystick teleoperation, you should setup the hector_quadrotor package (http://wiki.ros.org/hector_quadrotor).

There are two packages included: crazyflie and crazyflie_demo. Crazyflie contains the driver and a launch file which can be used in your own projects.

Crazyflie_demo contains a small demo for teleoperating the crazyflie with a joystick and visualizing the sensor data in rviz.

You can use

roslaunch crazyflie_demo teleop_xbox360.launch

to teleoperate the crazyflie. Please note that there are (optional) arguments to change the device uri and path to the sdk. See crazyflie_demo/launch/teleop_xbox360.launch for details.

The launch file supports the following arguments:

• crazyflieSDK: Path to the official SDK from Bitcraze, e.g. ~/crazyflie/crazyflie-clients-python/lib
• uri: Specifier for the crazyflie, e.g. radio://0/80/2M
• tf_prefix: tf prefix for the crazyflie frame(s)
• roll_trim: Trim in degrees, e.g. negative if flie drifts to the left
• pitch_trim: Trim in degrees, e.g. negative if flie drifts forward

See http://wiki.bitcraze.se/projects:crazyflie:userguide:tips_and_tricks for details on how to obtain good trim values.

Similar to the hector_quadrotor, package the fields are used as following:

• linear.y: roll [e.g. -30 to 30 degrees]
• linear.x: pitch [e.g. -30 to 30 degrees]
• angular.z: yawrate [e.g. -200 to 200 degrees/second]
• linear.z: thrust [10000 to 60000 (mapped to PWM output)]

• sensor_msgs/IMU
• contains the sensor readings of gyroscope and accelerometer
• The covariance matrices are set to unknown
• orientation is not set (this could be done by the magnetometer readings in the future.)
• update: 10ms (time between crazyflie and ROS not synchronized!)
• can be viewed in rviz

• sensor_msgs/Temperature
• From Barometer (10DOF version only) in degree Celcius (Sensor readings might be higher than expected because the PCB warms up; see http://www.bitcraze.se/2014/02/logging-and-parameter-frameworks-turtorial/)
• update: 100ms (time between crazyflie and ROS not synchronized!)

• sensor_msgs/MagneticField
• update: 100ms (time between crazyflie and ROS not synchronized!)

• Float32
• hPa (or mbar)
• update: 100ms (time between crazyflie and ROS not synchronized!)

• Float32
• Volts
• update: 100ms (time between crazyflie and ROS not synchronized!)

• https://github.com/gtagency/crazyflie-ros
  • no documentation
  • no teleop
• https://github.com/omwdunkley/crazyflieROS
  • coupled with GUI
  • based on custom firmware
• https://github.com/mbeards/crazyflie-ros
  • incomplete
• https://github.com/utexas-air-fri/crazyflie_fly
  • not based on official SDK
  • no support for logging
• https://github.com/mchenryc/crazyflie
  • no documentation

• The dynamic_reconfigure package (http://wiki.ros.org/dynamic_reconfigure/) seems like a good fit to map the parameters, however it has severe limitations:
  • Changed-Callback does not include which parameter(s) were changed. There is only a notion of a level which is a simple bitmask. This would cause that on any parameter change we would need to update all parameters on the Crazyflie.
  • Parameters are statically generated. There are hacks to add parameters at runtime, however those might not work with future versions of dynamic_reconfigure.
  • Groups not fully supported (ros-visualization/rqt_common_plugins#162; This seems to be closed now, however the Indigo binary packages did not pick up the fixes yet).