"Hello World" with Baxter

This tutorial assumes that the robot is powered on and that you have already setup the software environment for Baxter. This can be done by following the tutorial here.

Connect to robot and run the program

Configuring ROS environment and connect to robot

After setting up the software dependencies for ROS and Baxter manually configuring the environment and connecting to Baxter will be necessary. Rethink Robotics explains this well at steps 1 and 2 here.

If you have setup LAN access to the robot ensure the baxter.sh file under the ros_ws directory indicates a local IP.

Enable robot and send commands

After connection to the robot has been verified, navigate to the ros_ws directory and run the following code at terminal to enter the ROS environment:

  ./baxter.sh 

Next enable the robot. After running the following command you should hear Baxters joints turn on (by making a constant buzzing noise):

  rosrun baxter_tools enable_robot.py -e

Finally Baxter will wave its arms if you run the code:

  rosrun baxter_examples joint_velocity_wobbler.py 

Other Programs

For other examples see here here.

GMU Projects: ARCHR Project