Collada
We're working on a good integration between URDF and Collada. Right now you can already convert a URDF file into a Collada file. The next step is to make it possible to construct a C++ URDF object form a collada file. That will make it possible to use all the existing tools and code (urdf parser, kdl parser, etc) based on Collada files.
URDF specification
The URDF is designed to provide a user-friendly and easy to understand specification to describe a robot model. We intentionality keep the scope of the URDF limited and focussed. This means that new features such as e.g. motion-planning related models and parameters won't make their way into the URDF specification. The idea is to create specific and focussed specifications/parsers for each domain, so a motion-planning related specification/parser could exist independent of the URDF specification/parser.
While the COLADA specification covers large domain (and hundreds of pages), the URDF specification will remain limited. We do however care about interoperability with COLLADA, and provide conversion tools between URDF and COLLADA.
URDF Toolchain
We built an extensive toolchain around the URDF format. This means that once you have a URDF description of a robot, this description can be read by many different tools.
Convert the robot model into a KDL model
Rviz visualization support
Gazebo simulation support
Publish transform data using the robot_state_publisher
Arm planning support
- ...
The goal is to grow this toolchain over time.
Robot state publisher
The next version of the robot state publisher will be much more modular, in the sense that it will be able to publish partial kinematic trees based on joint states from different sources. See <<Ticket(ros-pkg 4465)>>.