fROS: A Generic Fieldbus Framework for ROS

As the development of advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) continues, more and more software functions and sensors are being introduced to the market. This is accompanied by an increase in the amount of data that has to be transmitted to multiple receivers in the vehicle under hard real-time requirements. The use of deterministic and non-deterministic Fieldbus protocols enables communication between sensor and actuator or ECUs. For the purpose of verifying and validating the developed software modules, but also for type approval, an objective and thus data-driven toolchain is mandatory. By using suitable middleware such as Robotic Operating System (ROS), the complexity of integrating multiple (reference) sensors as well as prototypical software functions can be broken down into subtasks and thus distributed to the hardware in a computationally efficient manner. Recording and manipulating sensor ECU communication while driving is also possible under certain circumstances. However, at least to our knowledge, there is no public ROS driver available to integrate automotive-specific Fieldbus protocols except for CAN. In the following paper, we introduce a generic and open-source framework for integrating on-board communication of various Fieldbus protocols and demonstrate the integration in ROS as a real-world use case. To validate the presented methodology, we perform a time analysis of the presented ROS node and compare it to a ROS-independent reference measurement system while performing a standardized vehicle dynamic driving test. In addition, we objectively compare two different on-board sensors from a series vehicle with two distinct reference sensors in a real-world scenario.