ROS (Robot Operating System) is an open-source robotics software framework. It helps design complex software without having a good understanding of the hardware.

Noetic is the new LTS release of ROS compatible with Ubuntu 20.04. It was announced on May 23rd. 2020 and you will get its support up to 2025.

Here at Ibmi Media, as part of our Server Management Services, we regularly help our Customers to perform related robotics software Installation queries.

In this context, we shall look into how to install ROS Noetic on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS.

Steps to Install ROS Noetic on Ubuntu OS ?

1. Setup ROS Noetic repository

Here, we need to add Noetic repo to source.list with the following command:

$ echo "deb http://packages.ros.org/ros/ubuntu focal main" | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/ros-focal.list

2. Add official ROS keyring

Here, Run apt-key command:

$ sudo apt-key adv --keyserver 'hkp://keyserver.ubuntu.com:80' --recv-key C1CF6E31E6BADE8868B172B4F42ED6FBAB17C654

You can also use the curl:

$ curl -sSL 'http://keyserver.ubuntu.com/pks/lookup?op=get&search=0xC1CF6E31E6BADE8868B172B4F42ED6FBAB17C654' | sudo apt-key add -

If the output appears "OK", it means you have added the key successfully.

3. Update the ROS package index

Run apt update:

$ sudo apt update

4. Install ROS Noetic package

The official ROS Noetic has 4 metapackages:

• ros-noetic-desktop-full.
• ros-noetic-desktop.
• ros-noetic-ros-base.
• ros-noetic-ros-core.

We recommend you should use ros-noetic-desktop-full to get the full experience. Let’s choose a package you want.

i. To install ros-noetic-desktop-full

Run apt command:

$ sudo apt install ros-noetic-desktop-full

ii. To install ros-noetic-desktop

ros-noetic-desktop has 8 packages: vis, angles, common_tutorials, geometry_tutorials, ros_tutorials, roslint, urdf_tutorial and visualization_tutorials:

$ sudo apt install ros-noetic-desktop

iii. To install ros-noetic-base:

$ sudo apt install ros-noetic-base

iv. To install ros-noetic-core:

$ sudo apt install ros-noetic-core

5. Set up ROS Noetic environment

You need to run the setup.bash file:

$ source /opt/ros/noetic/setup.bash

You should add it in the .bashrc file located in the home directory To avoid run the command above every time:

$ echo "source /opt/ros/noetic/setup.bash" >> ~/.bashrc

Run tail ~/.bashrc to verify:

$ tail ~/.bashrc

To make it take effect, run:

$ source ~/.bashrc

6. Verify Noetic installation

You can run roscd command to check if the installation was successful:

$ roscd

You can see where we have installed noetic in /opt/ros/noetic

You can also use roscore to verify noetic installation:

$ roscore

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