Dock Cycle: undock, dock, recharge & station services (ROS2 package)

Everything around the charging/service dock. The robot must undock at the start of a job, return to the dock (on completion or on low battery), dock precisely to make charge contact, trigger dock station services (recharge, and — where the dock supports them — auto-empty and mop-wash), and find the dock when it is lost and relocalization has already failed. Because the physical robot isn't built yet, this is a Gazebo simulation; it is later re-validated on hardware in the live-robot-bringup RFC.

Status — ready to start work. No need to wait for OOMWOO hardware — develop it in the Gazebo sim (urdf-gazebo-sim) or on the real placeholder Proscenic M6 Pro. Say so in the discussions so we can coordinate.

Important References

nav-localize RFC — localization + Nav2; the find-the-dock fallback is invoked when its relocalization fails.
clean-and-map RFC and cleaning-jobs RFC — trigger return-to-dock for recharge / auto-empty / mop-wash mid-job.
urdf-gazebo-sim RFC — robot URDF and Gazebo world(s) to model the dock in.
ROS2 software interfaces — shared topic/action/service contract for simulation-first modules.
Model a generic basic charging dock (charge contacts + a detectable marker). Exact dock geometry is TBD — the old teardown reference vacuum is no longer used.
OOMWOO ROS2 development — build OOMWOO ROS2 Docker image(s) with your packages.
Nav2 docking (opennav_docking) is a good starting point for precise approach.
Project discussions
Discord server

Request for Contribution - Instructions

model the dock in Gazebo
- add charge contacts and a detectable marker for the final approach (IR beacon, fiducial/AprilTag, or a reflective-intensity pattern the LiDAR can see)
- model a battery (drain during cleaning, charge curve while docked) so low-battery behavior can be tested
- model a generic basic dock (contacts + a detectable marker); exact geometry TBD
- post in Project Discussions to let everyone know you're working on it, and post your progress
undocking
- safely back / drive out of the dock to a known start pose, then hand off to cleaning
return-to-dock
- navigate to the dock vicinity, triggered by job complete OR low battery / full bin / mop needs washing mid-job (coordinate with cleaning-jobs)
precise docking
- final approach using the dock marker; align to the charge contacts; confirm charging started
dock station services
- once docked, trigger and wait for recharge, and — where the dock supports them — auto-empty and mop-wash; report completion so the job can resume
find-the-dock-when-lost
- fallback used when nav-localize relocalization has failed: run a search pattern to reacquire the dock marker, dock, and re-establish pose from the known dock location
test it well
- start from various poses and battery levels; verify undock → clean → return → dock → service → resume
- kidnap the robot so relocalization fails and verify find-the-dock recovers it
regression tests (headless, CI-friendly)
- docking success rate and final alignment error
- find-the-dock success rate from random lost poses
- low-battery return-then-resume completes without losing the job
submit a PR (pull request) to contributions/dock-cycle/<your-github-username>/
- link to ROS2 package(s) and the dock model / world additions
- instructions, documentation - how to install, run, configure, troubleshoot, test results
- videos of docking, find-the-dock, and low-battery return-and-resume
- announce your submission in Project Discussions
iterate with review
TBD, expect the RFC to evolve

Acceptance criteria

Objective, measurable. Examples:

Robot undocks reliably to a known start pose
Robot returns and docks precisely, making charge contact, from various poses (alignment within a stated tolerance)
Station services (recharge; auto-empty / mop-wash where modeled) are triggered, completed, and reported
Low-battery mid-job triggers return-to-dock and the job resumes after charging
Find-the-dock-when-lost recovers a kidnapped robot after relocalization fails
Regression tests pass (dock success, alignment error, find-the-dock success), runnable headless in CI
Documented and reliably reproducible by someone else
TBD, expect criteria to evolve

The maintainer selects among compliant candidates using these criteria. Multiple attempts are welcome and useful even if not selected — modules are swappable, and a non-selected design is still a valid learning exercise and a fallback.