In this tutorial, we will go over how to create a ROS 2 workspace.

In ROS 2, a workspace serves as the central point for organizing and developing your robot software. It’s a directory that houses all the different software packages, data files, and configuration scripts related to your specific robot project. Think of it as a dedicated folder for all your “robot building blocks.”

The official instructions for creating a workspace are here, but I will walk you through the entire process, step by step.

Let’s get started!

Prerequisites

• You have a computer that is running Ubuntu (I’m running my Ubuntu Linux inside a virtual machine on Windows 11).
• You have installed ROS 2 (version: Iron).

Directions

Open a terminal, and type these commands:

mkdir -p ~/ros2_ws/src

cd ~/ros2_ws/

colcon build

echo "source ~/ros2_ws/install/setup.bash" >> ~/.bashrc

That’s it! You have now created a ROS 2 workspace.