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Lighthouse Station Mapper

An interactive terminal-based tool for calibrating and mapping Lighthouse base station positions and orientations in 3D space.

Overview

This package provides a ROS 2 node with a terminal UI (built on FTXUI) that guides you through the process of determining the precise geometry of your Lighthouse tracking system. The node subscribes to raw lighthouse measurements from a deck and uses optimization to solve for the station poses.

Quick Start

Launch the interactive mapper with a connected lighthouse deck:

ros2 launch lighthouse_station_mapper interactive_mapping.launch.py device:=/dev/ttyACM0

See example in this video:

lighthouse_ros_full_cycle.mp4

Mapping Workflow

  1. Position the deck in your workspace where lighthouse stations are visible
  2. Wait for "READY TO SAMPLE" status - the system needs stable measurements from all visible stations
  3. Press 'Sample' (or 's') to capture a measurement snapshot at this position
    • The first sample you take defines the origin of the coordinate system
  4. Move the deck to a different position (at least 10-20 cm away with some rotation)
  5. Repeat steps 2-4 to collect samples from multiple deck positions (minimum 2, more is better)
  6. Press 'Solve station poses' (or 'v') to compute station poses
    • The coordinate system origin is placed at the first sample position
    • Results appear in the "Solution" table and are visualized in RViz (if enabled)
  7. Press 'Update map node' to send the computed station poses to the localization node
    • This enables real-time pose tracking using the calibrated station geometry

Other Controls

  • Save map - Write the current station geometry to a CSV file
  • Clear samples (or 'c') - Delete all samples and reset the solution
  • Quit (or 'q') - Exit the mapper

Published Topics

  • mapper_station_markers (visualization_msgs/msg/MarkerArray)

    • RViz visualization markers showing the solved base station poses
    • Published with transient_local QoS for late-joining subscribers

  • mapper_deck_pose_samples (visualization_msgs/msg/MarkerArray)

    • RViz visualization markers showing the deck positions where samples were captured
    • Helps visualize the spatial distribution of calibration data

  • mapper_deck_pose (geometry_msgs/msg/PoseStamped)

    • Current estimated deck pose during the sampling process
    • Published at 10 Hz when the deck is in view of stations

Subscribed Topics

  • lighthouse (lighthouse_deck_msgs/msg/LighthouseDeckMeasurement)
    • Raw angle measurements from the lighthouse deck driver
    • Used to collect calibration samples and compute station geometry

Service Clients

  • set_station_poses (lighthouse_station_mapper_msgs/srv/SetStationPoses)
    • Called when the "Update map node" button is pressed
    • Sends the solved station poses to the lighthouse_localization node

Parameters

  • max_angular_spread (double, default: 5e-3)

    • Maximum angular spread (in radians) allowed for measurements to be considered stable
    • Lower values require more stable/static deck positioning before sampling
    • Used to determine "READY TO SAMPLE" status

  • buffer_duration (double, default: 1.0)

    • Duration (in seconds) to buffer incoming measurements
    • Longer buffers provide more data for stability checks but increase latency

  • min_samples_per_station (int, default: 3)

    • Minimum number of deck pose samples required per station before solving is possible
    • More samples generally improve calibration accuracy

  • lighthouse_frame (string, default: "lighthouse")

    • Frame ID for the lighthouse coordinate system
    • Used in visualization markers and TF broadcasts