Insight - a minimalist GUI for ROS2

Insight is a minimalist GUI alternative to rqt. It is a GTK4-based tool for exploring ROS2 topics, services, and messages, featuring the GNOME Adwaita style.

Features

Nodes

Node List Page

• Browse all active ROS2 nodes
• Group nodes by namespace
• Search and filter nodes
• View hidden nodes

Node Info Page

• View detailed node information
• Display node publishers, subscribers
• Show service clients and servers and action clients and servers
• Show Node parameters and jump to the parameter edit page

Topics

Topic List Page

• Browse all available ROS2 topics
• Group topics by namespace
• Search and filter topics
• View topic types and hidden topics

Topic Info Page

• View detailed topic information
• Display topic interface types and their definition
• Show publishers and subscribers

Topic Publisher Page

• Publish messages to ROS2 topics
• Edit the published message as YAML/JSON/CSV
• Publish once or as continuous stream

Topic Subscriber Page

• Subscribe to ROS2 topics
• Receive messages as YAML/JSON/CSV
• Message history and filtering
• Get only one message or the continuous stream

Services

Service List Page

• Browse all available ROS2 services
• Group services by namespace
• Search and filter services
• View service types and hidden services

Service Info

• View detailed service information
• Show service providers
• Display service request/response interface type and definition
• Quickly jump to the service call page

Service Call Page

• Call ROS2 services
• Edit the service request as YAML/JSON/CSV
• View service responses

Actions

Action List Page

• Browse all available ROS2 actions
• Group actions by namespace
• Search and filter actions
• View action types

Action Info Page

• View detailed action information
• Display action interface type and definition
• Show action servers and clients
• Access goal/result/feedback structure

Action Goal Page

• Send goals to ROS2 action servers
• Edit the goal message as YAML/JSON/CSV
• View feedback and results

Parameters

Parameter List Page

• Browse all ROS2 parameters
• Group parameters by node
• Search and filter parameters
• View parameter types and values

Parameter Edit Page

• Edit ROS2 parameter values
• Support for different parameter types
• Real-time parameter updates
• Parameter validation

Packages

Package List Page

• Browse all ROS2 packages
• Search and filter packages
• View package information

Package Info Page

• View detailed package information
• Show package executables
• Access package metadata
• Display package dependencies

New Package Dialog

• Create new ROS2 packages
• Configure package settings
• Set dependencies and build type
• Specify destination directory

Launch Files

Launch List Page

• Browse available launch files
• Search and filter launch files
• View launch file information

Launch Info Page

• ! STILL EXPERIMENTAL !
• View launch file details
• Display launch arguments, and started nodes
• Launch file execution

Interfaces

Interface Browser Page

• Browse ROS2 message/service/action interfaces
• Interfaces are grouped by their packages
• Switch between all/msgs/srvs/actions interfaces types
• Access interface infos

Interface Info Page

• View interface constants
• Separate message / service (request/response) / action (goal/feedback/result)
• Navigate through nested interfaces
• Open interface definitions in a separate text editor or show it online
• View detailed interface definitions
• Display default values for basic data types (like int, string etc)

Interface Definition Page

• Show raw interface definition as YAML/JSON/CSV
• Copy string representation into clipboard

Misc

TF Page

• View TF transformation tree
• Display coordinate frames
• Show frame relationships

Image Viewer Page

• Display ROS2 image topics
• Show images as single shot or continuous stream
• Image format support
• Display image meta data

Teleop

• Robot teleoperation interface with Twist (and later Joy)
• Control it via direction buttons or via keyboard

Graph Page

• ! STILL EXPERIMENTAL !
• Visualize ROS2 node-topic connections
• Interactive graph layout
• Quickly jump to respectify info page for further info on the node/topic

Joint States Page

• ! STILL EXPERIMENTAL !
• Monitor robot joint states

Diagnosis

Doctor Page

• ROS2 system diagnostics
• Network configuration check
• Package version information
• QoS compatibility analysis

Logger Page

• View ROS2 log messages
• Filter logs by severity
• Regex search for messages and nodes

GUI Features

Preferences Dialog

• Change the settings of the application
• Set ROS2 environmental variables
• Theme and appearance options
• Behavior configuration

Multi-Window Support

• Multiple windows via detachable pages

Shortcuts

• CTRL+R or F5 triggers a refresh of the page
• CTRL+F triggers the search on every page
• CTRL+D detaches the current page into a new window
• CTRL+ENTER triggers the pages main action (like publish)
• CTRL+Q closes the current window

Appearance

• DARK THEME! (depending on the current system theme)

Prerequisites

Install the following packages, as some currently cannot be installed by rosdep (I'm working on it).

sudo apt install libgtk-4-dev libgirepository1.0-dev adwaita-icon-theme libadwaita-1-dev libglib2.0-dev python3-gi python3-gi-cairo python3-networkx python3-graphviz

Installation

Binary Install with apt

! THIS IS NOT WORKING YET, but hopefully will in the future (I'm waiting for approval) !

sudo apt install ros-jazzy-insight-gui

Install from Source

1. Create the workspace and clone this repo:

mkdir -p ros2_ws/src
cd ros2_ws/src
git clone https://github.com/julianmueller/insight_gui

If you want the jazzy-dev branch, where I'm currently working on the latest features, use:

git clone -b jazzy-dev https://github.com/julianmueller/insight_gui

2. Install dependencies with rosdep:

rosdep install --from-paths src -y --ignore-src

3. Build the workspace:

colcon build --symlink-install
source install/setup.bash

Execution

Like every other ros2 node, the GUI is started by:

ros2 run insight_gui main

License

GPLv3. See LICENSE.