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Select Simulator for Universal Robots

The Robotics System Toolbox™ Support Package for Universal Robots UR Series Manipulatorsprovides support for Gazebo and URSim simulators for Universal Robots. You can use universalrobot class and associated method to read data and control the simulated robot in Gazebo or URSim. The following table describes few metrics which can help you to select the manipulator which is most suitable for your intended application.

Simulator Metric Gazebo URSim
Ease of Installation High Low
Interaction with simulated objects and manipulator Possible Not Possible
Similarity with actual Hardware Low High
Graphical Interface with Robot state information Not Available Available

With Gazebo simulator, you will be able to visualize a simulated world with the manipulator and interact with different virtual objects.

With URSim simulator, you will be able to visualize and interact with the graphical user interface similar to the teach pendant of the Universal Robots manipulator. The movement of the manipulator, along with some state information, is visible on the graphical user interface.

Installation

  • Gazebo: Use this simulator if the primary focus is to develop motion planning algorithms or to simulate complex application workflows involving multiple robots, simulated objects, and sensors.

    No additional installation steps are required as the ROS installation process (Install ROS Packages and Dependencies for ROS) installs the Gazebo.

  • URSim: Use this simulator if the end goal is to enable connectivity between MATLAB® and Universal Robots hardware.

    Refer to Set Up URSim Offline Simulator to set up the URSim simulator and ROS.

    All rights of the offline simulator application belong to Universal Robots A/S.