Pre- and Post-installation Disk Layout reference

The toplevel bin/ directory

This shouldn’t contain very much... just “anointed” central binaries used by the entire distribution. Most programs (like ROS nodes) will reside in each package’s bin/ directory.

Pre-installation

Source directory

e.g. for project ‘proj’:

src/
  proj/
    CMakeLists.txt
    stack.xml  # explains interstack dependencies and debian-generating rules
    msg/
      ProjMsg.msg
    srv/
      ProjSrv.srv
    src/
      proj/
        __init__.py
        othercode.py
      libproj/
        CMakeLists.txt
        proj.cpp
    include/
      proj/
        proj.hpp
        otherheaders.hpp

Build directory

build/
  env.sh
  setup.sh
  setup.bash
  setup.zsh

  etc/
    catkin/
      profile.d/
        00.catkin.buildspace.sh   # env hooks.  this one is a placeholder added by catkin.
        10.ros.buildspace.sh      # e.g. the one from ROS

    packages.list           # mapping from pkg name to subdirectory of build/src dirs, see below

  gen/
    cpp/                    # All generated C++ headers go here.
      proj/
        ProjMsg.h
        ProjSrvRequest.h
        ProjSrvResponse.h
    py/                     # All generated python goes here.
      proj/
        __init__.py         # uses pkgutil to add src/proj/src/ to pythonpath
        msg/
          __init__.py       # generated code
          _ProjMsg.py
          _ProjSrvRequest.py
          _ProjSrvResponse.py
  lib/                      # all compiled libraries go here
    libproj.so
  proj/
    # the usual cmake-generated stuff.
    Makefile
    CMakeFiles/
    cmake_install.cmake

Post-installation

/opt/ros/fuerte/            # CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX

  bin/
    roscore                 # possibly some special anointed binaries
    rosbag@                 # symlink to share/rosbag/bin/rosbag
    setup.sh                # generated for this environment by catkin
    env.sh

  lib/
    libros.so               # shared libraries for all packages
    libcpp_common.so
    librostime.so
    libfoo.a                # also static libraries
    pythonX.Y/              # python from all packages
      rospy/
        __init__.py         # static code
        client.py
        core.py
        ...
      std_msgs/
        __init__.py         # generated code
    pkgconfig/              # pkgconfig files are autogenerated
      roscpp_serialization.pc
      nav_msgs.pc

  include/                  # all includes, together.
    std_msgs/
      Float64.h             # generated header
    ros/
      node_handle.h         # "static" hand-coded header
      time.h
      xmlrpc_manager.h

  etc/
    catkin/
      profile.d/
        00.catkin.sh
        10.ros.sh
    ros/
      rosinstall.conf       # used by rosinstall to set ROS_PACKAGE_PATH
      langs/                # to determine which code generators are available.
        roscpp              # contains "C++"
        rospy               # contains "Python"
      depends.yaml          # rosdep main database
      depends.d/
        00_something.yaml   # addons
        10_somethingelse.yaml

  share/                    # During transition, this is also ROS_PACKAGE_PATH
    roscpp_tutorials/       # one dir like this per package
      manifest.xml          # thunk to pkgconfig for transition;
                            # takes care of exporting to legacy rosmake.
      bin/
        talker              # possibly linked-to from CMAKE_PREFIX_PATH/bin
        listener
      cmake/                # cmake infrastructure, per-package
        roscpp_tutorials-config.cmake
        roscpp_tutorials-config-version.cmake
        messages.cmake
      msg/
        Foo.msg
        Bar.msg
      action/

      something.launch      # the rest is as the package installs it

   stacks/
     dry_stack1             # built/installed via rosmake
     dry_stack2             # built/installed via rosmake

Notes on individual files

etc/packages.list

Contains a mapping of package name to path-to-the-package-relative-to-CATKIN_(BUILD|SOURCE)_DIR, e.g.:

XmlRpc ros_comm/utilities/xmlrpcpp
catkin catkin
cpp_common roscpp_core/cpp_common
gencpp gencpp
genmsg genmsg
genpy genpy
genpybindings genpybindings
geometry_msgs common_msgs/geometry_msgs
nav_msgs common_msgs/nav_msgs
nolangs nolangs
rosconsole ros_comm/tools/rosconsole
roscpp ros_comm/clients/cpp/roscpp
roscpp_serialization roscpp_core/roscpp_serialization
roscpp_traits roscpp_core/roscpp_traits
rosgraph_msgs ros_comm/messages/rosgraph_msgs
roslib ros/core/roslib
rospy ros_comm/clients/rospy
rostime roscpp_core/rostime
sensor_msgs common_msgs/sensor_msgs
std_msgs std_msgs