It can be challenging to get started with ROS, because it can involve using a whole new operating system. The page below can help you get started.
A ROS workspace is nothing special. It is just a directory and can be named anything you want.
└───ros_ws
│ └───build (auto-generated during a build)
│ └───install (auto-generated during a build)
│ └───log (auto-generated during a build)
│ └───src
│ └───package_1
│ └───src
| └───package_2
| └───package_3
Here’s an example of a ROS workspace named ros_ws. Note that you should never have workspaces inside of other workspaces.
The point of the workspace is to create a designated space to organize and build all of your project’s executables. The src directory contains the source code for the workspace, which is organized in packages. This is where most of your work will happen.
When you need to clean your workspace, you can use the following command: rm -rf build install which will recursively remove the directories of buildand install and the files inside of them. Optionally you can also delete the log directory as well.
A ROS package is a (ideally) self-contained unit which holds the software for a particular robot capability.