Astro Hacker News - PeppyOS: A simpler alternative to ROS 2 (now with containers support)

kevin42 |next [-]

I'd love to use something other than ROS2, if for no other reason than to get rid of the dependency hell and the convoluted build system.

But there are a lot of nodes and drivers out there for ROS already. It's a chicken and egg thing because people aren't going to write drivers unless there are enough users, and it's hard to get users without drivers.

It looks like their business model is to give away the OS and make money with FoxGlove-like tools. It's not a bad idea, but adoption will be an uphill battle. And since they aren't open source yet, I certainly wouldn't start using it on a project until it us.

droelf |root |parent |next [-]

We're working hard to get ROS out of dependency hell - https://prefix.dev/blog/reproducible-package-management-for-...

Would love to hear your thoughts.

dheera |root |parent |previous [-]

ROS is, in my opinion, dying on the industry front.

* It is a dependency hell

* It is resource-heavy on embedded systems

* It is too slow for real-time, high speed control loops

* Huge chunks of it are maintained by hobbyists and far behind the state of the art (e.g. the entire navigation stack)

* As robotics moves toward end-to-end AI systems, stuff needs to stay on GPU memory, not shuttled back and forth across processes through a networking stack.

* Decentralized messaging was the wrong call. A bunch of nodes running on a robot doesn't need a decentralized infrastructure. This isn't Bitcoin. Robots talking to each other, maybe, but not pieces of code on the same robot.

sgillen |root |parent [-]

Can you say more about the nav stack? I thought nav2 was considered one of the better more mature packages in ROS2, but it's not my area of expertise.

| As robotics moves toward end-to-end AI systems, stuff needs to stay on GPU memory, not shuttled back and forth across processes through a networking stack.

NVIDIA actually is addressing this with NITROS: https://nvidia-isaac-ros.github.io/concepts/nitros/index.htm...

And ROS native buffers: https://discourse.openrobotics.org/t/update-on-ros-native-bu...

cjwoodall |next |previous [-]

I will admit I have almost always made the choice to not use ros2. I am trying to use it now for some work, and I can see where/when it would be useful...

But I almost always feel like there is just so much STUFF involved in ros, that really is just better resolved by having really robust controllers, well defined protocols, and everything else.

I wait to pass judgement until I have more information though

mikepurvis |root |parent |next [-]

I've been a ROS 1 (and now 2) user since 2010. I like the game engine analogy given elsewhere in the thread, in that ROS gives you some important things "for free" if you cooperate with its ecosystem conventions. Data bagging, visualization, teleop, and sim are the some obvious ones that I think a lot of teams don't think about if they're just focused on getting cartographer or whatever going, and not considering the larger development and debugging questions.

For some, packaging/deployment would also fall under the umbrella of a solved-by-ROS problem, however I don't think the Open Robotics supplied debs are suitable for most product deployments, for a variety of reasons that I've discussed in two separate ROSCon talks.

dimatura |root |parent |next |previous [-]

I usually feel the same when starting something new. The "STUFF" is annoying and often feels like overkill when a project is new and minimal. Installing/building ROS, the package boilerplate, etc. And often I can get away with more minimal alternatives like just a single (possibly multithreaded) process, or multiple processes with a simple IPC. But then again I often end up wanting a lot of the extra stuff you get with ROS like the bags, the viewers, the cli tools, etc. LLMs help on both fronts though - they're decent at making DIY versions of ROS-like functionality, but they're also pretty good at handling the ROS boilerplate. (Which is one area where I'd see peppyOS being a severe disadvantage).

jeff-hykin |root |parent |next |previous [-]

As someone who has used ros2, I feel fine passing judgment; it is terrible. If its easier to write your own stack, do it. Your own stack will be easier to add to and maintain long term. The conceptual design (nodes) is great, its just the execution that is awful.

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colinator |next |previous [-]

I've got one of these! Mine is called 'roboflex' (github.com/flexrobotics). It's c++/python, not rust. But similarly born out of frustration with ros. Writing your own robotics middleware seems to be a rite of passage. Just like 'writing your own game engine'. Nothing wrong with that - ros is powerful but has legit problems, and we need alternatives.

Although tbh, these days I'm questioning the utility. If I'm the one writing the robot code, then I care a lot about the ergonomics of the libraries or frameworks. But if LLMs are writing it, do I really care? That's a genuine, not rhetorical question. I suppose ergonomics still matter (and maybe matter even more) if I'm the one that has to check all the LLM code....

jeff-hykin |root |parent [-]

Take a look at github.com/dimensionalos/dimos. We are a team making - not only a replacement for ROS - but one that can be easily vibe coded, and one with compatibility with ros and containers.

Always looking for testers and feedback if you want to influence the design/API.

steve_adams_86 |next |previous [-]

It looks like this is cleaner and simpler than ROS 2, and the API seems nice, but it would be really difficult to diverge from the standard and use an ecosystem with a very small community and no momentum behind it. Does this have any compelling selling points to convince someone to switch other than 'less overhead than ROS 2'?

I'm not trying to downplay that selling point at all. My experience with ROS 2 is limited but that aspect of it was miserable.

This is such a small nit, but landing at the docs page (https://docs.peppy.bot/) and seeing this splash is annoying to me. Just show the docs.

Also it would be nice if I could switch between Rust and Python examples and have all code panes respect that choice, rather than have to switch every pane to Rust.

a_t48 |next |previous [-]

Hey uh - good luck. I spent a while smashing my head against this.

You should read https://basisrobotics.tech/2025/01/08/postmortem/ and consider: - How you will get users - How you will fund development - What the "good parts" from ROS and other frameworks you want to take

I notice you don't have shared memory transport, nor do you support runtime composability (I think?). This might make perception heavy stacks run poorly. I'm also a little confused on what serialization format you support - is it an entirely custom one? It looks like two publishers with the same topic type will duplicate the schema, which is a bit odd. Worth also considering how you will do recording/replay.

Additionally - BSL feels great, but I found it scared off some people. IMO just do Apache 2.0 if you're going to have some other revenue stream anyhow.

I spent like...a year thinking about this stuff, happy to chat at kyle@basisrobotics.tech if you need a friendly ear.

094459 |next |previous [-]

This doesnt look open source, so maybe not a good comparison with ROS

antoineleclair |root |parent [-]

I see in their FAQ:

> Will PeppyOS be open source?

> Yes! PeppyOS will be fully open source under a BSL license before the end of this year. Once the software is mature, everyone will be able to contribute and participate in its development.

pavon |root |parent [-]

BSL is not an open source license. It is a proprietary source-available license that prohibits any "production" use.

irishcoffee |next |previous [-]

One of the only ways I can imagine that would _somehow add even more complexity_ to the disaster that is ROS/ROS2, is to try and make rust a first-class citizen.

You're using ROS2, so you have a problem. You want to add rust to fix it? Now you have 47 problems.

LatticeAnimal |next |previous [-]

IIRC, the ROS UR controller runs at 200Hz and we’ve had arms crash when they run much slower than that.

The website claims “30hz polling rate”, “2ms latency”. Not sure if that is a best case or just for that demo.

digikata |root |parent [-]

Crash? The software, or physically? A 200Hz as a min control loop rate seems on the fast side as a general default, but it all depends on the control environment - and I may be biased as I've done a lot more bare silicon controls than ROS.

Symmetry |root |parent [-]

I'm guessing running a 200 Hz command rate on an e-series UR which uses 1 kHz internally will give you a protective stop?

Jenzaah |next |previous [-]

What makes this better than HORUS? Also Rust based, and opensource already.

ijustlovemath |root |parent [-]

There's no actual source for this, just some examples

blensor |root |parent [-]

Looking through the website and github, it looks a bit premature to post at all. I don't have too much love for ROS personally but that claim the title is making is quite bold

AlfredBarnes |next |previous [-]

https://xkcd.com/927/

luc_ |previous [-]

yet another roll your own ROS...