The NI Vision Libraries and Packages

This project implemets the methods described in A computer vision system for rapid search inspired by surface-based attention mechanisms from human perception as ROS nodes in C++.

Original Contributors

Jong-han Park, Fritjof Wolf, Johannes Mohr

License and Citation

The code for this project is released under the BSD 2-Clause license.

Please cite the ni_vision project in your publications if it helps your research:

@article{Mohr2014,
  author = {Mohr, Johannes and Park, Jong-han and Obermayer, Klaus},
  doi = {10.1016/j.neunet.2014.08.010},
  issn = {0893-6080},
  journal = {Neural Networks},
  pages = {182--193},
  title = {{A computer vision system for rapid search inspired by surface-based attention mechanisms from human perception}},
  url = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.neunet.2014.08.010},
  volume = {60},
  year = {2014}
}

Getting your build up and running

Prepwork

Install ROS Hydro

Download and build GTest:

Indeed testing with GTest is enabled by catkin. However, since we also rely on OpenCV, OpenCV's GTest symbols conflict with those provided by catkin and executing the tests results in a malloc error.

Using gtest with cv_bridge fails Issue: cv_bridge exposes internal GTest symbols from OpenCV and/or links incorrectly

GTest source and build can go outside your catkin workspace.

• mkdir ~/src
• Download GTest
• unzip to ~/src
• cd ~/src/gtest-1.7.0
• cmake . # perform an in-source build
• make

Download and build the ELM libraries:

ELM source and build can go outside your catkin workspace.

• mkdir ~/src # unless you've alreaded created it
• cd ~/src
• git clone git@github.com:kashefy/elm.git
• mkdir -p ~/build/elm/ros_static
• cd ~/build/elm/ros_static

For CMake >= 2.8.9:

• cmake -DBUILD_SHARED_LIBS=OFF -DGTEST_ROOT=~/src/gtest-1.7.0 ~/src/elm

For earlier versions of CMake:

• cmake -DBUILD_SHARED_LIBS=OFF -DCMAKE_CXX_FLAGS="-fPIC" -DGTEST_ROOT=~/src/gtest-1.7.0 -DOpenCV_DIR=/opt/ros/hydro/share/OpenCV/OpenCVConfig.cmake ~/src/elm

• make -j2

Building the NI Vision Libraries and packages:

• mkdir ~/catkin_ws # Create a catkin workspace
• mkdir ~/catkin_ws/src # Create a src sub directory
• clone this repository to ~/catkin_ws/src/. You'll end up with ~/catkin_ws/src/ni_vision
• catkin_make --cmake-args -DGTEST_ROOT=/src/gtest-1.7.0 -DELM_DIR=/build/elm/ros_static

Running the unittests for target ni: ~/catkin_ws/devel/lib/ni/run_ni_unittests