Explore with a simulated ROSMASTER R2

R2 Explorer drives a simulated ROSMASTER R2 through an indoor world. It builds an observed map, selects destinations it has not visited, and checks curved forward and reverse paths against lidar returns. A front depth check limits forward movement. The planner reads sensors and odometry, without reading the simulator's obstacle list.

This sample requires the managed rosmaster-r2 VM profile. It has no physical robot backend and refuses to start without the simulator's identity and sensors.

Prepare the simulator

You need Git, Go, Docker, and the Wendy VM prerequisites. Build Wendy from the same checkout as the sample so the CLI includes its R2 runtime:

git clone https://github.com/wendylabsinc/WendyOS.git
cd WendyOS
make -C go build-cli
./go/bin/wendy vm create r2-explorer --profile rosmaster-r2
./go/bin/wendy vm robot start r2-explorer
./go/bin/wendy vm robot open r2-explorer

Keep this terminal in the repository root. The first build needs internet access. For an existing VM with an older agent, follow the R2 runtime setup to update the agent. After rebuilding a CLI with changed simulator sources, use ./go/bin/wendy vm robot update r2-explorer to update the pinned runtime.

Deploy and explore

./go/bin/wendy run --prefix Examples/R2Explorer --device vm:r2-explorer --detach

Open the exploration dashboard. It starts parked. Select Start exploring to transfer app control and begin a run. The default duration is 120 seconds; the dashboard accepts runs from 5 to 600 seconds. Watch the observed map, driven path, goal and color/depth previews as the car moves.

Select Stop or press Space in the dashboard to stop early. Closing the tab does not stop a run; its timer continues in the app container. The simulator's Stop, Pause, Reset or controller selection also interrupts exploration. The app stops on stale sensors, contact, loss of control or timer expiry and never resumes automatically. Select Start again when ready for a new run.

Stop in the app sends zero motion for its own control session. The simulator's Stop or controller selection revokes ownership. If another controller has taken over, the explorer's Stop does not interrupt that controller.

Read the map and run state from a second terminal:

curl --fail http://127.0.0.1:3510/api/status

To stop the deployed app entirely:

./go/bin/wendy device apps stop henk-explorer --device vm:r2-explorer

The simulator's 300 ms command watchdog stops motion if the app disappears.

Change the planner

Examples/R2Explorer/planner.py contains visit memory, goal selection and the Ackermann path rollout. app.py handles sensor freshness, control ownership, time limits and HTTP endpoints. The sample uses only Python's standard library. Its unit tests and offline simulator acceptance check run from the sample directory:

cd Examples/R2Explorer
python3 -m unittest discover -s tests -v
python3 tests/simulator_acceptance.py

This is reactive exploration with ideal simulator odometry. It can revisit areas or stop where no safe path is available; it does not implement SLAM or guarantee complete coverage. Camera optics, depth noise and drivetrain dynamics are idealized. A hardware port needs calibrated sensors, localization and a physical motion backend. See sim to real for the supported interfaces and explicit service backend selection.