Plugins¶

Creating OpenRAVE plugins allows others to use your work by just instantiating the interfaces through the RaveCreateX methods. Although it is highly recommended to start working with Python/Octave, eventually users should create plugins to offer their functionality through them.

The simplest way to create a plugin is through the openrave-createplugin.py program:

For example, the following command will create a plugin that offers MyNewModule Module:

openrave-createplugin.py myplugin --module MyNewModule

This creates a myplugin directory where all the files are written in. In order to compile and test it do:

cd myplugin
make
python testplugin.py

By default, the new plugin/executable is stored in the build folder. The following files are created to help users get started:

• CMakeLists.txt - used to create Makefiles and Visual Studio solutions
• Makefile - for Unix users, type ‘make’ to build the CMake project.
• myplugin.cpp - main C++ file
• testplugin.py - will load the plugin inside OpenRAVE and call its SendCommand method.
• scenes/robots - directories holding scene and robot files

For more details, please see

Writing Plugins and Interfaces in C++

Programs¶

It is also possible to create and use OpenRAVE inside a program by linking with the openrave-core library. The simplest way to create an example program is:

openrave-createplugin.py myprogram --usecore

This will create a simple program that creates the OpenRAVE Environment and Loads a scene. The environment is created without attaching any viewer.