Baxter on your own laptop

The lab machines are the easiest way to work with Baxter (Baxter on a lab machine). This tutorial is for your own laptop instead, with a network cable plugged straight into the robot. The bridge needs Linux with Docker: on Windows that is WSL2, Ubuntu inside Windows.

Commands in code boxes are typed into a terminal. Where a command contains something in angle brackets, like <robot name>, replace the whole thing, brackets included.

Step 1: Linux on Windows (Windows only)

On an Ubuntu laptop, skip to step 2.

In PowerShell, install Ubuntu:
```
wsl --install -d Ubuntu-24.04
```
wsl --version should show WSL 2.0 or newer.
Let WSL use the same network connections as Windows, so it can reach the robot. Create the file C:\Users\<your user name>\.wslconfig with this content:
```
[wsl2]
networkingMode=mirrored
```
Then run wsl --shutdown in PowerShell, wait ten seconds, and open Ubuntu again. wslinfo --networking-mode in Ubuntu now prints mirrored.

Let the robot connect back into WSL. The robot opens connections to the bridge to deliver commands, and Windows blocks those by default. In a PowerShell opened with Run as administrator:

New-NetFirewallHyperVRule -Name BaxterRobotTcp -DisplayName "Baxter robot into WSL (TCP)" -Direction Inbound -VMCreatorId '{40E0AC32-46A5-438A-A0B2-2B479E8F2E90}' -Protocol TCP -RemoteAddresses 169.254.0.0/16 -Action Allow
New-NetFirewallHyperVRule -Name BaxterRobotUdp -DisplayName "Baxter robot into WSL (UDP)" -Direction Inbound -VMCreatorId '{40E0AC32-46A5-438A-A0B2-2B479E8F2E90}' -Protocol UDP -RemoteAddresses 169.254.0.0/16 -Action Allow

The network adapter the robot is plugged into has to get its address automatically (Settings → Network & internet → Ethernet → IP assignment: Automatic).

Step 2: Get the code and set up (once)

In Ubuntu, in your home folder (on Windows: not under /mnt/c, which is slow):

git clone https://github.com/Hull-Robotics-Society/baxter-ros2-bridge.git ~/baxter-ros2-bridge
cd ~/baxter-ros2-bridge
bash scripts/setup.sh

setup.sh installs Docker if it is missing and downloads the bridge’s ready-made image. Then it depends on the laptop:

With ROS 2 installed (Jazzy or Lyrical), it builds Baxter’s messages and the library in ~/baxter_ws, and source ~/baxter_ws/baxter.sh sets up a terminal, as on the lab machines.
Without ROS 2, it downloads the client image instead: a container with ROS 2 and the library, in which your programs run.

On Windows, use the Docker that setup.sh installs inside Ubuntu, not Docker Desktop: keep Docker Desktop closed while you work with the bridge. If Docker was just installed, open a new Ubuntu window before you go on.

Step 3: Connect to the robot (every session)

Release the e-stop, then switch the robot on (switched on with the e-stop pressed, it refuses to enable later). Plug the network cable into the robot and into the laptop.

Ubuntu: set the wired connection’s IPv4 method to Link-Local Only.
Windows: nothing to do after step 1.

About a minute after the robot has started, both sides have an address starting with 169.254.. On a cable, the robot’s name is its serial number with .local: 011603p0009.local for robot 1, 011602p0013.local for robot 2.

On Ubuntu:

cd ~/baxter-ros2-bridge
bash scripts/add_robot.sh 011603p0009.local
docker compose up -d bridge

On Windows, WSL can’t look up .local names itself, so look the robot’s address up in PowerShell first:

ping -4 011603p0009.local

Then, in Ubuntu, with the 169.254.x.x address from the answer:

cd ~/baxter-ros2-bridge
ROBOT_IP=<the robot's address> bash scripts/add_robot.sh 011603p0009.local
docker compose up -d bridge

The robot gives itself a new address each time it starts, so run add_robot.sh again after every restart of the robot.

Step 4: Check the connection

bash scripts/robot_check.sh --only network

This checks that the laptop reaches the robot, and the robot the laptop. The full check, bash scripts/robot_check.sh, goes through the whole robot stage by stage. Before every stage that makes the robot move, it says what will happen and waits until you type yes, so someone has to be at the e-stop for it.

Step 5: Run a program

With ROS 2 installed:

source ~/baxter_ws/baxter.sh
python3 ~/baxter-ros2-bridge/examples/01_read_robot.py

Without ROS 2, in the baxter-ros2-bridge folder:

docker compose run --rm client python3 examples/01_read_robot.py

The example only reads: it prints the robot’s software version, the left arm’s joint angles and where both hands are. Your first Baxter program continues from here.

Step 6: End the session

Stop your programs, and fold the arms: ros2 run baxter_interface tuck_arms -t (without ROS 2, with docker compose run --rm client in front). It disables the robot at the end.
Stop the bridge: docker compose --profile tools down.
Shut the robot down with its power button, wait until it is off, then switch off its power. Leave the e-stop released.

Good to know

setup.sh and add_robot.sh haven’t been tried yet on a laptop with the robot on a cable. The steps they take are the ones that ran the whole robot check from WSL2 on a laptop.
If the laptop has a second wired adapter that is plugged in somewhere, unplug it for the session.
A VirtualBox virtual machine instead of WSL2 is much slower on Windows 11, and stood still for more than a second at a time (why).

The repository’s bridge-machine.md explains each step in more detail, and own-machine.md how to program from a second computer while the bridge runs on another.