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On the software team, the operating system we use is Ubuntu 20.04. Ubuntu is a popular Linux distribution that supports ROS2, a robotics framework which that is at the core of our architecture. Note: Microsoft has recently released full ROS Melodic binaries for Native Windows Installation and there is experimental support for ROS on macOS. There is also the option of using ROS on WSL (Windows Subsystem for Linux) without any gui compatibility(rviz, rqt, etc). Many 3rd party packages don't release binaries for macOS and Windows. Any of the above 3 methods is highly discouraged, unless you have extensive ROS experience already and want to fiddle with it. We will not provide any support to you using ROS ROS2 on anything other than an Ubuntu 20.04 installation (maybe windows).
Ubuntu can be installed in one of two ways: Dual Booting, or Virtual Machine. Dual Booting involves adding a partition to your computer’s hard drive and installing Ubuntu on the new partition. This allows you to run both your original OS and Ubuntu on your computer natively , and can take advantage of your full laptop hardware (CPU cores, GPU, ports, etc). This is the strongly preferred method, but the process of dual booting has some risks associated with it (a mistake could wipe your main OS). Be sure to backup all your important files before proceeding with a dual-boot setup. A Virtual Machine involves running a guest OS, such as Ubuntu, virtually within a host OS, such as Windows or Mac. This is risk-free, but VM’s often suffer from poor performance, especially when using ROS. VM’s typically cannot take advantage of your GPU, and external ports and interfaces do not always work properly. Additionally, we have found that some computers refuse to cooperate with VM’s.
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