The base Leo Rover software can be divided into 3 main elements:
Firmware
This is the program that runs directly on the processor of CORE2 board. It provides different functionalities to the Raspberry Pi through serial bus. The main features of the default leo_firmware are:
When the Raspberry Pi boots, a set of ROS nodes is started. These nodes allow different features to be accessed via ROS topics and services. They are defined in leo_bringup package and mainly consist of:
rosserial node - communicates with the firmware via serial interface and makes its features available via ROS topics and services
Rosbridge server - creates WebSocket that provides a JSON API to ROS functionality for non-ROS programs.
Raspicam node - publishes images from Raspberry Pi camera module to ROS image transport topic
Web video server - provides a video stream of a ROS image transport topic that can be accessed via HTTP
Leo system node - provides system shutdown and reboot via ROS topics.
Web User Interface
This is the user interface that can be accessed via a web browser. It communicates with Rosbridge server using roslibjs to access functionalities that are available in ROS topics. The default leo_ui brings features such as:
control of the Rover via a keyboard or a virtual joystick