Move large map files to Git Large File Storage

[gsaponaro]

Hi @plinioMoreno @ruipimentelfigueiredo @joao-avelino!

I noticed that the whole vizzy repository takes about 200MB at the moment, the majority of which due to the larges files in vizzy_navigation/maps (115MB).

Suggestion: host those large files elsewhere using Git Large File Storage, which looks like a nice possibility for these cases. Cloning/Working with the vizzy repository will be faster, while those files will still be available and maintainable on the "external" LFS reference.

[gsaponaro]

Other large-ish directories are:

• vizzy_gazebo/media/others/models (18MB)
• vizzy_gazebo/media/models (6MB)
• vizzy_robot/calibration_data (13MB)
• vizzy_description/meshes (13MB)

[gsaponaro]

Hi @plinioMoreno

Related to this issue: I just made a fresh clone of the vizzy repository on my machine, it now takes up 529MB of space and it took several minutes for cloning. If you want to make this repository slimmer (if you see a benefit for it), there are mainly two avenues: (1) clean up the repository history (e.g., remove deleted files, check out git gc or garbage collection command for that); (2) move the files that are not always needed (e.g., maps) to another repository, or external server and add a script to download those big files only when needed.
Of course every choice has pros and cons. Just letting you know it might become more and more of an issue if the system grows more complex, if the number of map files increases every year, etc.

[plinioMoreno]

Thanks for the reminder @gsaponaro, I will do a cleanup soon and very likely move the vizzy_navigation/maps and vizzy_description to the large files repository.

[plinioMoreno]

Following your suggestion @gsaponaro, we moved all the extra maps to the repository https://github.com/vislab-tecnico-lisboa/extra_maps, and now this extra_maps repository is a submodule. Next step will be execute git gc and check for other large files.

[gsaponaro]

Sounds good. Thanks for letting me know!