Announcing protoros2: use protobuf in ros2 without compromise

ROS ROS General
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Hi ROS Community! :waving_hand:

For years, there has been a strong and consistent demand for seamless Protobuf serialization in ROS/ROS 2. While there are excellent existing tools in the community, integrating them cleanly into a high-performance, production-ready pipeline often comes with friction.

Today, we’re excited to introduce protoros2 — a middleware wrapper and orchestration engine designed to provide zero-intrusive protobuf support for ROS 2. ZhenshengLee/protoros2: use protobuf in ros2 without compromise

(The name is heavily inspired by the awesome flatros2 GitHub - Ekumen-OS/flatros2 · GitHub project!)

:rocket: What does protoros2 do?

protoros2 does not reinvent the wheel. Instead, it acts as a non-intrusive “Tri-State Orchestration Engine” that elegantly binds third-party Open-Source foundations into a unified architecture. It allows you to use Protobuf in your stack without compromise.

It provides an out-of-the-box EnterpriseNode wrapper that offers multi-channel communication:

• Proto Channel (Zero-Intrusive Fast-Path): Transparently inspects the underlying RMW serialization format at runtime. If the RMW supports Protobuf natively, it routes messages directly via rclcpp::SerializedMessage. If not, it gracefully falls back to standard CDR via rclcpp::TypeAdapter.
• Flat Channel (Performance Bonus): An optional bypass channel optimized for ultra-low latency IPC (powered by Iceoryx shared memory), fully adapted to the ROS 2 executor ecosystem.

:sparkles: Key Features & Use Cases

We designed protoros2 to be flexible enough to accommodate different team workflows, supporting multiple “Single Source of Truth” (SSOT) architectures seamlessly:

• Use Case A: Standard ROS 2 .msg as SSOT
Write your standard .msg files as usual. protoros2 works seamlessly with standard RMWs (CDR only) or native Protobuf RMWs without altering your application logic. In fallback modes, it can even handle simultaneous CDR and Protobuf topic ecosystems flawlessly.
• Use Case B: AI/Robotics .proto as SSOT
For AI-first teams, define your data structures natively in .proto. protoros2 can either co-exist with a generated mirror IDL or operate purely on .proto, bypassing .msg entirely for a direct, zero-overhead binding.
• Native ROS 2 Executor Support:
Whether you prefer standard Callback Push, WaitSets, CallbackGroups (Mutually Exclusive/Reentrant), Polling Subscribers, or Intra-Process Comm—protoros2 natively integrates these paradigms out of the box.
• MLOps Ecosystem Ready:
Full compatibility with mcap format and rosbag2 plugins. Data scientists can consume protobuf bags directly with native python bindings.

:shield: Enterprise Security Built-in

To ensure consistency in large-scale deployments, protoros2 utilizes strict C++ access controls to safely encapsulate the raw rclcpp::Node. It intercepts and disables risky dynamic ROS 2 configurations (like parameter services and QoS overriding) at compile time, guaranteeing predictable behavior on the vehicle edge without sacrificing the standard ROS 2 developer experience.

:folded_hands: Acknowledgement

This work stands on the shoulders of giants. We want to express our deepest gratitude to the following incredible projects and their contributors, without which protoros2 would not have been possible:

• rosidl_typesupport_protobuf https://github.com/eclipse-ecal/rosidl_typesupport_protobuf: For providing the robust C++ TypeSupport handle and TypeAdapter generation engine.
• proto2ros https://github.com/rai-opensource/proto2ros: For the brilliant AST parser bridging .proto definitions to synthetic IDL .msg.
• ros-central-registry https://github.com/intrinsic-opensource/ros-central-registry/blob/main/examples: For the excellent Bazel + ROS 2 integration examples and Protobuf C++ references.