| Note: This tutorial assumes that you have completed the previous tutorials: Troubleshooting Rapps. |
 Please ask about problems and questions regarding this tutorial on answers.ros.org. Don't forget to include in your question the link to this page, the versions of your OS & ROS, and also add appropriate tags. |
Create a Rapp Index
Description: How to create a Rapp indexKeywords: rapp index
Tutorial Level: BEGINNER
Next Tutorial: Install Rapps
Overview
The index feature of the rocon_app tool allows the creation of rapp indicies. A rapp index bundles and archives multiple rapps. The index can the be uploaded in order to allow easy sharing of rapps with others.
Preparation
Make sure you already create one or more rapps and stored them in a ROS package. Refer to the Create a Robot App tutorial, in case you haven't.
Create an index
The indexing is done automatically by the rocon_app tool. You just need to point it at your rapps folder.
$ rocon_app index <path-to-rapp-package>
The indexer will create an archive called <my_package_name>.index.tar.gz. You can now store this archive locally or upload it (e.g.GitHub, Bitbucket etc.).
Add rapp index to local index
By default rocon_app list crawls your ROS workspace to find rapps. The rapps you indexed in the previous step are probably in your workspace and hence already listed. However, let's consider the case of a workspace, which does not contain the source of the rapps you just indexed.
In order to add the rapps in your index do:
$ rocon_app add-repo <index-path>
This command will create a list of indexes at ~/.ros/rocon/rapps/rapp.list. When introspecting this file, you will see the ROS_PACKAGE_PATH, which contains your locally installed rapps (sources and debs), and each index you added.
Now, rocon_app list should show the rapps contained in the newly added index.
Accordingly, rocon_app remove-repo removes indexes from the list.
$ rocon_app remove-repo <index-path>
Note, that the <index-path> can also be a URL.
Next Up
In the next tutorial you will get to now the install feature of the rocon_app tool. Both the index and the install feature together enables you to conveniently download and run rapps developed by others.
