The Robot Operating System is an open-source project that is essentially middleware between Linux, sensors, actuators and algorithms. Its purpose is to facilitate the design, debugging and operation of software for robots. If you want to move away from amateur-hour spaghetti code and create software you can build upon, robot after robot, then a middleware (or framework) like ROS is an absolute necessity. That is not open to debate outside the confine of YouTube commenteers who’ve never built a robot or programmed anything more complex than a pocket calculator. You don’t want to be that guy.
I’ve seen more than my fair share of operating systems, frameworks, middlewares, stacks and other assortments of more or less stable piles of code. However, I’m new to ROS. Let’s see what I can make of it. I have great expectation, what with all the YouTube videos advertising it as the best thing since real-time bread-slicers.
Oh and if you’re wondering about the turtle : apparently that’s the ROS equivalent of Linux’s Tux. I hope it doesn’t mean ROS is slow…