Robot Developer Extensions for ROS 2 (RDE for ROS 2)

A Visual Studio Code extension supporting Robot Operating System 2 (ROS 2) development on Windows, Linux and macOS.

This project is derived from ranchhandrobotics/rde-ros-2 and ms-iot/vscode-ros (both MIT licensed), with thanks; see the license details at the bottom and ThirdPartyNotices.

🇨🇳 中文说明:README.zh-CN.md

Features

• Automatic ROS environment setup — Detects the distribution and loads the environment when a ROS 2 workspace opens; supports pixi environments and custom setup scripts, and re-collects automatically when shell configuration files change.
• ROS 2 status page — Start the extension's resident helper (an rclpy process talking to DDS directly) with one click to inspect nodes / topics / services / parameters / lifecycle; subscribe to topics, call services, send action goals (structured forms), and open oversized parameters as full content.
• Package contents sidebar — Shows each package's executables, launch files, Python exports, resources and headers based on the actual install directory; inline run / build buttons and click-to-source navigation.
• Build integration — Ctrl+Shift+B smart build (multi-select packages + argument presets); the build command is fully customizable via a settings template; pre-build checks catch install-method (symlink/copy) and layout (merged/isolated) conflicts with fix suggestions.
• Run & launch — ros2 run / ros2 launch with argument presets and per-target memory; targets never cross-contaminate.
• Testing — Integrated with the VS Code Test Explorer: discovers C++ gtest and Python pytest tests automatically, with run/debug and result parsing.
• Language services — Completion, hover, definition, formatting and diagnostics for .msg/.srv/.action; include-graph-driven navigation, hover, completion and D1-D14 diagnostics for .xacro/.urdf; launch files (py/XML/YAML) completion and include navigation.
• Code snippets — Curated Python (rclpy) and C++ (rclcpp) snippets covering nodes, publishers/subscribers, services, actions, parameters, logging and launch files.
• IntelliSense configuration — Automatically maintains include paths for cpptools and clangd (selectable engine) and merges compile_commands.json.
• Package creation wizard — Generates C++ / Python / mixed packages: built-in dependency picker, naming and reserved-name validation, launch/resource templates.
• ROS 2 terminal — Creates terminals with the ROS environment pre-loaded (bash/zsh/fish/pwsh/cmd all supported); right-click a folder to build or scaffold quickly.
• rosdep / Doctor — Shortcuts for rosdep dependency installation and ros2 doctor diagnostics.
• Bilingual UI — English and Simplified Chinese interfaces, following the VS Code display language.

Getting started

1. Install the extension (the C/C++ and Python extension dependencies are installed automatically).
2. Open a ROS 2 workspace containing a package.xml; the extension activates and loads the environment automatically.
3. Click the ROS distribution tag on the bottom status bar to open the status page; use the "ROS 2 Packages" icon in the activity bar for the package contents view.

Development status

This extension is under rapid active development — features and behavior may change between versions. Development and testing were done primarily on Linux (ROS 2 Humble); Windows has not been systematically tested, so unexpected behavior is possible there (the status page in particular). If you run into problems, please report them at Issues — feedback directly drives what gets fixed next.

Configuration

Key settings (see docs/configuration.md):

• ROS2.env.* — distribution / setup script / pixi environment;
• ROS2.build.shareSpec / ROS2.run.shareSpec / ROS2.launch.shareSpec — the template & preset mechanism for the three commands;
• ROS2.build.installMethod / ROS2.build.installLayout — install method (auto / symlink / copy) and layout;
• ROS2.search.* — workspace scan exclusions, symlink following and timeouts.

Documentation

Full documentation (usage / tutorials / testing / configuration / IntelliSense / snippets / pixi / troubleshooting — in English and Simplified Chinese) lives in the repository docs/ directory.

Support

Please report problems at Issues with the ROS distribution, operating system, reproduction steps and relevant logs from the "ROS 2" output channel.

Contributing

Issues and PRs are welcome; see CONTRIBUTING.md.

License & acknowledgements

This project is released under the MIT License. Derived from Ranch Hand Robotics' rde-ros-2 and Microsoft's vscode-ros; upstream copyright notices are retained per their terms.