Installing the COBOTTA Driver

Modified on Tue, 17 Aug 2021 at 11:18 AM

Info:
Read the Disclaimer in the Introduction.

Estimated Completion Time: 45 minutes

The following document explains how to install the driver into the COBOTTA. If ROS Melodic has not been installed, go back to the Installing ROS Melodic document. If the driver is installed, proceed onto the Installing the ROS Dependencies, Source Code, and Build Folder document.

Steps 1 through 12 explain how to install the COBOTTA Driver.

Note: 
Make sure the kernel version currently installed is compatible with the COBOTTA Driver (see image below on compatible kernels). To see the kernel version that is currently installed, enter 'uname -r' into the terminal. If the current kernel is not compatible, see the How to Change the Kernel document.

Step 1: Begin by entering the DENSO Wave website (COBOTTA Driver for Linux) to download the zipped folder.	Note: Download the proper driver folder based on the Ubuntu version that was installed.
Step 2: Download the zipped folder and save the folder to an easy to access directory, such as the Home directory.	Warning: DO NOT UNZIP THE DONWLOADED FOLDER!
Step 3: Steps 3 to 7 will show how to access the howto-install-driver.md file if the user wishes to reference the file. Begin by double-clicking on the zipped folder and enter the unlabeled folder.
Step 4: Enter the denso_cobotta-<version>-X.Y.Z-YYYYMMDD folder.	Note: X.Y.Z stands for the version being used, such as 1.2.1. YYYYMMDD stands for the year, month, and day the version was released, such as 20210118 (Jan. 18, 2021). <version> stands for the ROS version being used, such as melodic.
Step 5: Enter the document folder.
Step 6: Open the howto-install-driver.md file using a text editor.
Step 7: Follow the instruction from the file in step 7 along with following steps 9 to 11. At the end, an image of a text editor will be displayed for the user to view the full code used to enter into the terminal to install the driver.	Warning: DO NOT ENTER ANY ANGLE BRACKETS WHEN TYPING INTO THE TERMINAL WHEN ENTERING THE VERSION NAME, DIRECTORY, OR DOWNLOAD FOLDER NAME. EX: enter melodic instead of <version> or Desktop instead of <directory>.
Step 8: Obtain the COBOTTA driver by entering the following into the terminal:	$ cd ~/ $ cd <directory> $ tar xvf <download-folder-name> $ ln -s denso_cobotta-<version>- X.Y.Z-YYYYMMDD denso_cobotta Note: The <directory> should be used if the user did not save the zipped folder in the Home directory.
Step 9: Copy the driver into the kernel directory by entering the following into the terminal:	$ sudo cp ~/<directory>/denso_cobotta/ driver/$(uname -r)/denso_cobotta.ko \ > /lib/modules/$(uname -r)/kernel/drivers/ $ sudo depmod -a Note: A '/' is the equivalent as pressing the 'Enter' key. Therefore, if the 'Enter' key is pressed after typing '/', the command will continue on a new line.
Step 10: Load the driver into the COBOTTA by entering the following into the terminal:	$ sudo modprobe denso_cobotta io_power_mode=1
Step 11: Give the user ownership by entering the following into the terminal:	$ sudo chown <OWNER>:<GROUP> /dev/denso_cobotta Note: The <OWNER> and <GROUP> names are from the names registered when installing Ubuntu. To see the login name [displayed as uid=1000(username)] and group [displayed as groups=1000(groupname)], enter the following into the terminal: $ id
The image displayed in the box to the right contains the code entered into the terminal to install the driver using the ROS Melodic Morenia folder:	Note: If the driver does not autoload at the startup of the COBOTTA (when turning on the COBOTTA), see the Fixing the COBOTTA Driver to Autoload at Startup document.
This concludes the Installing of the COBOTTA Driver document. Proceed onto the Installing the ROS Dependencies, Source Code, and Build Folder document.	Finished