OpenMORA 101

Introduction

OpenMORA is an open-source framework for distributed applications. It is based on:
- MOOS (GitHub) for communications and app managing.
- MRPT (GitHub) for sensor interfacing, robotics algorithms and data marshalling.
Together, MOOS and MRPT have a small footprint and allow modules to be written in C++ and run in a number of platforms and operative systems (Windows, OSX, GNU/Linux, GNU/kFreeBSD).
Scripts are provided to automate the process of updating and (re-)compilation from sources.
MOOS is a middleware based on the publish-subscribe (pub/sub) pattern. It comprises a core C++ library and a set of tools for managing and monitoring communities of distributed modules. There exists a central hub called MOOSDB.
Repositories or packages: Git repositories published by partner institutions. Each repository may contain one or several modules.
Modules: The smallest elements in OpenMORA. They are executable programs capable of publishing to or subscribing to topics.
Topics are named, shared variables that represent the unique kind of interaction between modules.
MOOS-only modules can interact with topics of only two types: double and string/binary.
MOOS+MRPT modules can exchange more complex messages in the form of convenient C++ classes, e.g. laser scans, occupancy grid maps, etc.

Note: It is strictly mandatory to study how MOOS works before getting deeper into OpenMORA. Study these MOOS tutorials.

The OpenMORA GitHub organization contains these repositories:

mora-base: The core of OpenMORA: core tools and common libraries: core-moos, essential-moos and OpenMORA scripts (mora-build, etc.).
- mora-base/distro/openmora-pkgs.yaml: List of all "official" OpenMORA repositories.
dataset-tools-pkg: Modules for grabbing datasets in MRPT RawLog format and playing them back.
Many other repositories. Browse their documentation or directly on GitHub.

After installing, this is the recommended directory layout:

OPENMORA_DIR: The root or workspace directory, located anywhere in the system.
- OPENMORA_DIR/bin: Executables built from all the modules.
- OPENMORA_DIR/mora-base: Core components
- OPENMORA_DIR/*-pkg: Other OpenMORA packages
  - OPENMORA_DIR/*-pkg/build: Temporary build and CMake files for each package.