ROS RViz issues when starting using robot_startup

Question

Background

I have an application that requires that I start several RViz windows in a headless ROS environment. The system is required to send image files to some locally networked dumb terminals which can barely but adequately show image files (.jpg). Therefore, I simply take screen snapshots of the RViz displays and send those. This works well, however, I need to run the RViz windows on startup.

Implementation

The ROS noetic system is running on Ubuntu 20.04. I used robot_upstart to give me a working skeleton for a systemd service and then modified the core service file to allow display_manager access

This is my working system.d service file called 'test.service'

    [Unit]
    Description="bringup test"
    After=network.target
    After=display_manager.service
    Wants=display_manager.service
    
    [Service]
    Type=simple
    Environment="XAUTHORITY=/run/user/1000/gdm/Xauthority"
    Environment="DISPLAY=:0"
    Environment="XDG_RUNTIME_DIR=/home/<my_username/catkin_ws/tmp"
    Environment="/home/<my_username>"  # THIS FIXED THE ISSUE
    ExecStart=/usr/sbin/test-start
    
    [Install]
    WantedBy=multi-user.target

This almost works. journalctl -f -u test.service lists an error:

Jun 06 21:10:22 aoede test-start[10209]: /opt/ros/noetic/lib/rviz/rviz: line 1: 10220 Aborted                 (core dumped) $0 $@
Jun 06 21:10:25 aoede dbus-daemon[10259]: [session uid=1000 pid=10257] AppArmor D-Bus mediation is enabled
Jun 06 21:10:28 aoede test-start[10237]: terminate called after throwing an instance of 'boost::filesystem::filesystem_error'
Jun 06 21:10:28 aoede test-start[10237]:   what():  boost::filesystem::create_directory: Permission denied: "/.rviz"
Jun 06 21:10:28 aoede test-start[10218]: Aborted (core dumped)

It is trying to write to a directory /.rviz . When I create this directory myself with relaxed permissions it then works correctly and the RViz windows all start. This directory seems to be filled with persistence files for the RViz instances.

I have tried setting XDG_RUNTIME_DIR as above but it had no effect. What environment variable should I set, or other way, so that RViz is looking in a more rational place? Also, would appreciate any recommendations on better practices than above.

James James · Accepted Answer · 2021-06-09T12:00:42

The required environment variable is $HOME This was being set after the service was run and was therefore not available.

Environment="/home/<my_username>"

Fixed the issue

ROS RViz issues when starting using robot_startup

1 Answers