ROS 2 Visualization Tools for Architecture

ROS ROS General
1

Hello everyone,

I was wondering what kind of visualizations tools do you use or are aware to see the architecture of a ROS 2 system?

For instance, if you would like to see the connections between nodes and topics (e.g., I know that rqt can show that), visualize messages flow, parameters, or even documentation.

Thank you!
Paulo

2 Likes
2

I’ve worked on a tool for visualizing the flow of messages* between nodes over time (and more):

(* and support for service requests/replies was just merged: ros2/ros2_tracing#145, eclipse-tracecompass-incubator/org.eclipse.tracecompass.incubator#127)

5 Likes
How do you monitor your robot diagnostics (topic rates)?
3

I guess you need tools like rqt_graph?

ros2/ros_network_viz (github.com)
Introducing ros2_graph - General - ROS Discourse
ROS diagram tools - ROS Projects - ROS Discourse
New visualization for ROS 2 systems: Call for datasets - General - ROS Discourse
iwatake2222/dear_ros_node_viewer: Dear RosNodeViewer: Visualize ROS2 Node Graph (github.com)

there are also many other TUI/CLI Tools rather than GUI that can help you inspect the runtime arch of ros2 system.

3 Likes
4

Late to this thread but I built something that directly addresses this.

ros2grapher statically analyzes your Python and C++ source files and
generates an interactive graph of nodes, topics and services without
needing a running system. It also uses AI to resolve dynamic topic names.

GitHub: GitHub - Supull/ros2grapher: Scan your ROS2 workspace and visualize node topology as an interactive graph. No running system needed. · GitHub

5

Interesting work. One gap I’ve seen is that most tools don’t catch semantic issues like Xacro residue, broken references, or invalid prefixes.

While testing models like NASA Robonaut 2 and KUKA iiwa, I noticed these issues still exist in real repos.

Built something to validate beyond syntax: