Flightkit x Elodin CubeSat SITL

This repository prototypes a lockstep software-in-the-loop integration between:

• Bright Ascension HELIX Flightkit flight software, built as native C with hfk.
• The Elodin CubeSat attitude simulation, adapted from examples/cube-sat in elodin.

The target demo is a Flightkit C controller detumbling an Elodin CubeSat with three reaction wheels.

Note: Currently requires Ubuntu 22.04 only

Quick start

Install Pre-requisites

 curl -LsSf https://astral.sh/uv/install.sh | sh\n # install astral uv Python version manager
 sudo apt install git-lfs  # install git lfs package
 git lfs install # configure git to use lfs
 git lfs fetch && git lfs checkout # if you already cloned this repo, run to fetch assets

Download and install Helix Flightkit:

https://brightascension.com/portal/flightkit-documentation/2026.3.0-1/index.html

Elodin install and setup

bash scripts/install_elodin.sh # installs latest elodin and elodin-db release
uv venv -p 3.13 && source .venv/bin/activate # python environment install and activation
uv sync # install elodin python sdk

Build and run the SITL Demo

bash scripts/build_fsw.sh
elodin editor sim/main.py

Verify a headless run detumbled successfully:

bash scripts/build_fsw.sh
elodin run sim/main.py
python scripts/verify_run.py

The deep dive — system topology, lockstep cycle, wire protocol, module reference, and design decisions — is in ARCHITECTURE.md.