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PEAK-System® PCAN®-Basic

Controller Area Network (CAN) is one of the widely used Fieldbus protocols in industrial automation. On Linux, applications can talk to a CAN bus over SocketCAN. On Windows, applications talk to a CAN bus using vendor-provided libraries.

Today we are demonstrate how to use a CAN library, PCAN-Basic, from PEAK-System Technik GmbH. In this tutorial, we will show you an example how to begin with a ROS package, integrate with the CAN library, and perform the basic I/O to a CAN Bus.

For more details, visit PEAK-System.

Prerequisite

  • You have a machine with Windows 10 installed.
  • You have ROS Melodic Desktop Full installed.
  • You have PCAN adapters. We use PCAN-miniPCIe in this tutorial.
  • You have the CAN adapters connected to a CAN network and all devices are commissioned to work.
  • You have a ROS command prompt ready to use.

Step 1: Creating a ROS package

Firstly, you will need a catkin workspace to begin with. Assuming you have an empty workspace under c:\can_ws, now create a new package.

:: change the directory to the source subfolder.
c:\can_ws> cd src

:: create your owned package
c:\can_ws\src> catkin_create_pkg my_pkg

Step 2: Adding PCAN-Basic SDK

The next step is to add PCAN-Basic library into your package. This example shows a way to pull and place the library into the correct location by CMake convention. Now open and edit the CMakeLists.txt under src\my_pkg.

# Decide what architecture for the target
set(TARGET_ARCH "Win32")
if(CMAKE_SIZEOF_VOID_P EQUAL 8)
    set(TARGET_ARCH "x64")
endif()

# Create locations to place the PCAN-Basic library
file(MAKE_DIRECTORY
    ${CMAKE_BINARY_DIR}/installed/pcan-basic/bin
    ${CMAKE_BINARY_DIR}/installed/pcan-basic/lib
    ${CMAKE_BINARY_DIR}/installed/pcan-basic/include)

# Pull down the PCAN-Basic library
include(ExternalProject)
ExternalProject_Add(
    pcan-basic
    URL https://www.peak-system.com/fileadmin/media/files/pcan-basic.zip
    URL_MD5 d388e723046e7b2f6bd06489a12a3d96
    PREFIX ${CMAKE_BINARY_DIR}/pcan-basic
    CONFIGURE_COMMAND ""
    BUILD_COMMAND ""
    INSTALL_COMMAND ${CMAKE_COMMAND} -E copy_directory
                    <SOURCE_DIR>/include ${CMAKE_BINARY_DIR}/installed/pcan-basic/include
    COMMAND ${CMAKE_COMMAND} -E copy
            <SOURCE_DIR>/${TARGET_ARCH}/PCANBasic.dll ${CMAKE_BINARY_DIR}/installed/pcan-basic/bin
    COMMAND ${CMAKE_COMMAND} -E copy
            <SOURCE_DIR>/${TARGET_ARCH}/VC_LIB/PCANBasic.lib ${CMAKE_BINARY_DIR}/installed/pcan-basic/lib
    LOG_DOWNLOAD ON
    LOG_INSTALL ON
    )

# Initialize include paths and library paths
set(pcan_LIBRARIES ${CMAKE_BINARY_DIR}/installed/pcan-basic/lib/PCANBasic.lib)
set(pcan_INCLUDE_DIRS ${CMAKE_BINARY_DIR}/installed/pcan-basic/include)

# Remember to install the DLL side-by-side to ROS application
install(FILES
    ${CMAKE_BINARY_DIR}/installed/pcan-basic/bin/PCANBasic.dll
    DESTINATION ${CATKIN_GLOBAL_BIN_DESTINATION}
)

And now you can build the package and see if everything is set up correctly.

:: Build the workspace
c:\can_ws> catkin_make install

:: Add the install space into the current environment.
c:\can_ws> install\setup.bat

Step 3: Adding Simple CAN Read\Write Loop

Now you have the PCAN-Basic library ready to use in your ROS workspace. We are going to add a simple node doing the basic read/write loop. Now you go to the editor, create a file of src/my_pkg/src/my_pkg_node.cpp under your workspace, and copy & paste the below code:

#include <windows.h>
#include <PCANBasic.h>

#include <exception>
#include <iostream>

#include <ros/ros.h>
#include <ros/callback_queue.h>
#include <ros/console.h>

class PCANLoop
{
public:
    PCANLoop()
    {
        TPCANStatus result = CAN_Initialize(PCAN_PCIBUS1, PCAN_BAUD_500K);
        if (result != PCAN_ERROR_OK)
        {
            throw std::runtime_error("CAN_Initialize failed.");
        }
    }

    void process()
    {
        send();

        while(read()); // process till the queue goes empty
    }

private:
    bool read()
    {
        TPCANMsg received = {0};

        TPCANStatus result = CAN_Read(PCAN_PCIBUS1, &received, NULL);
        if (result == PCAN_ERROR_QRCVEMPTY)
        {
            return false;
        }
        else if (result == PCAN_ERROR_OK)
        {
            // COMMENT: read the message here.
            return true;
        }

        throw std::runtime_error("CAN_Read failed.");
    }

    void send()
    {
        // COMMENT: replace the message with yours.
        TPCANMsg request = {0};
        request.ID = 0;
        request.MSGTYPE = PCAN_MESSAGE_STANDARD;
        request.LEN = 8;

        TPCANStatus result = CAN_Write(PCAN_PCIBUS1, &request);
        if (result != PCAN_ERROR_OK)
        {
            throw std::runtime_error("CAN_Write failed.");
        }
    }
};

/**
* Control loop for PCAN
*/
void controlLoop(PCANLoop &loop)
{
    try
    {
        loop.process();
    }
    catch (std::exception &e)
    {
        ROS_ERROR_STREAM("controlLoop exception:" << e.what());
    }
}

int main(int argc, char **argv)
{
    ros::init(argc, argv, "my_node");
    ros::NodeHandle nh, private_nh("~");

    try
    {
        double control_frequency;
        private_nh.param<double>("control_frequency", control_frequency, 50.0);

        PCANLoop loop;

        ros::CallbackQueue queue;
        ros::AsyncSpinner spinner(1, &queue);

        ros::TimerOptions control_timer(
            ros::Duration(1 / control_frequency),
            boost::bind(controlLoop, boost::ref(loop)),
            &queue);
        ros::Timer control_loop = nh.createTimer(control_timer);

        spinner.start();

        // Process remainder of ROS callbacks separately, mainly ControlManager related
        ros::spin();
    }
    catch (std::exception &e)
    {
        ROS_ERROR_STREAM("exception:" << e.what());
    }

    return 0;
}

We will explain the code later. We need to describe the new node and its dependency in CMakeLists.txt and package.xml. Now open and edit the src\my_pkg\CMakeLists.txt file under the workspace.

src\my_pkg\CMakeLists.txt

Below is an example to describe a new node in CMake.

## Find catkin macros and libraries
## if COMPONENTS list like find_package(catkin REQUIRED COMPONENTS xyz)
## is used, also find other catkin packages
find_package(catkin REQUIRED COMPONENTS roscpp)

...

###########
## Build ##
###########

## Specify additional locations of header files
## Your package locations should be listed before other locations
include_directories(
  ${catkin_INCLUDE_DIRS}
  ${pcan_INCLUDE_DIRS}
)

## Declare a C++ executable
## With catkin_make all packages are built within a single CMake context
## The recommended prefix ensures that target names across packages don't collide
add_executable(${PROJECT_NAME}_node src/my_pkg_node.cpp)

## Rename C++ executable without prefix
## The above recommended prefix causes long target names, the following renames the
## target back to the shorter version for ease of user use
## e.g. "rosrun someones_pkg node" instead of "rosrun someones_pkg someones_pkg_node"
set_target_properties(${PROJECT_NAME}_node PROPERTIES OUTPUT_NAME node PREFIX "")

## Add cmake target dependencies of the executable
## same as for the library above
add_dependencies(${PROJECT_NAME}_node ${${PROJECT_NAME}_EXPORTED_TARGETS} ${catkin_EXPORTED_TARGETS})

## Specify libraries to link a library or executable target against
target_link_libraries(${PROJECT_NAME}_node
  ${catkin_LIBRARIES}
  ${pcan_LIBRARIES}
)

#############
## Install ##
#############

# all install targets should use catkin DESTINATION variables
# See http://ros.org/doc/api/catkin/html/adv_user_guide/variables.html

## Mark executables for installation
## See http://docs.ros.org/melodic/api/catkin/html/howto/format1/building_executables.html
install(TARGETS ${PROJECT_NAME}_node
  RUNTIME DESTINATION ${CATKIN_PACKAGE_BIN_DESTINATION}
)

src\my_pkg\package.xml

Make sure roscpp in the <depend> list.

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<package format="2">
  <name>my_pkg</name>
  ...
  <depend>roscpp</depend>
  ...
</package>

Simple CAN Read/Write Loop

In this example, we use Callback and Spinning from roscpp to set up a control loop running at 50Hz. In the callback, we read all the messages from the PCAN message queue and send a empty message to the CAN Bus. Depending on your CAN devices, you may need to add more protocol-specific implementation on top of the basic I/O.

Step 4: Building the Workspace

Now we have all the code in place. Let's rebuild the workspace again to ensure everything built.

:: Build the workspace
c:\can_ws> catkin_make install

:: Add the install space into the current environment.
c:\can_ws> install\setup.bat

Step 5: Running the ROS Application

Before we launch the application, we need to make sure rosmaster is up and running. Start another ROS command prompt and run roscore. Now we are ready to run this application.

c:\can_ws> rosrun my_pkg node

Summary

In this tutorial, we walk through the steps of integrate PCAN-Basic library into your ROS package, how to consume it by an simple CAN read/write loop application. You are encouraged to proceed on the official PCAN-Basic documentation to learn more.