LCM
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LCM is a package designed to allow multiple processes to exchange messages in a safe and high-performance way. A message is the basic unit of LCM communications: it represents a self-contained piece of information. Messages are defined as programming language-independent data structures; the lcm-gen tool compiles these definitions into language-specific code.
Each message is sent on a channel, which is identified by a human-readable name. For example, messages containing information about the temperature in the hallway might be published on the "HALLWAY_TEMPERATURE" channel. By convention, all messages on a channel have the same type.
Any application can publish on any channel, although it is common for a single application serves as the sole source of data on a channel. Any application can receive data on any channel— for example, both a thermostat application and data logger might subscribe to the "HALLWAY_TEMPERATURE" channel.
This tutorial will walk you through the main tasks for exchange messages between two applications:
Since the type definitions are language independent, the first step is the same for all programming languages.
The remaining steps vary across programming languages, consult the following sections for language-specific tutorials.
Note that C and C++ are considered to be separate programming languages. It is possible to use the C bindings from C++, but there are also LCM bindings specific to C++.
Additional examples are provided with the source distribution of LCM.
For each language, at least two examples are provided. One listens for a message, the other transmits a message. The LCM type used is defined in example_t.lcm (examples/types/example_t.lcm
in the source distribution).
Additional examples are distributed with the LCM source in the examples/
directory.
Language | Listener | Transmitter |
---|---|---|
C | listener.c listener-async.c | send_message.c |
C++ | listener.cpp | send_message.cpp |
C# | example_t_display.cs | example_t_transmit.cs |
Java | MySubscriber.java | SendMessage.java |
Lua | listener.lua | send-message.lua |
MATLAB | listener.m | sendmessage.m |
Python | listener.py | send-message.py |