Initial localization guess in ROS?

[xperroni]

I'm using RTAB-Map in ROS to provide a robot with global localization. When running in localization mode, RTAB-Map sometimes fails to localize the robot immediately, requiring it to be manually driven across the environment for a while before it can localize itself. Is there any way to give RTAB-Map a hint of the robot's initial global pose, so it could always be localized (even if not very accurately) from the start?

[matlabbe]

Hi,

There is no way to do that right now. THe best thing to do is to make sure to finish the run in front of location with a lot of visual features so that it can relocalize on the first frame on start. I opened an issue (https://github.com/introlab/rtabmap_ros/issues/220) to add such information for convenience, when we cannot ensure that the robot will finish in front a location easily recognizable.

cheers,
Mathieu

[friedrichgerhard]

Hi,

I am trying to give an initial guess for the robot position on a given map when I start rtabmap in localization mode (I am working on ROS).

I try that by writing my initial guess as rtabmap::Transform in the field opt_last_localization in the table Admin of the rtabmap.db.

Unfortunately, this does not work. Is this a sensible approach? Is there any other way to give an initial pose so far?

Thank you for your help!

[matlabbe]

Hi,

The easiest way is to do it with RVIZ's "2D Pose Estimate" button by remapping (Panels->Tool Properties) its topic to /rtabmap/initialpose if rtabmap has been started in rtabmap namespace. The topic name can be found with:

$ rostopic list | grep initialpose

cheers,
Mathieu

[friedrichgerhard]

Hi,

thanks for the reply, this helps a lot! To set the initial pose automatically from code I publish now a geometry_msgs::PoseWithCovarianceStamped on the topic /rtabmap/initialpose.

Thank you!