marinholab_sas_core

ROS-free C++ core of the SmartArmStack. This repository holds the pure C++ part of SmartArmStack/sas_core: everything that does not depend on ROS2 and does not depend on pybind11.

More information about SmartArmStack is available in smartarmstack.github.io.

Installation

The supported installation is the SmartArmStack apt repository, which provides the pre-built libmarinholab-sas-core package (LGPL, amd64 and arm64):

curl -s --compressed "https://smartarmstack.github.io/smart_arm_stack_ROS2/KEY.gpg" \
| gpg --dearmor \
| sudo tee /etc/apt/trusted.gpg.d/smartarmstack_lgpl.gpg >/dev/null
sudo curl -s --compressed -o /etc/apt/sources.list.d/smartarmstack_lgpl.list \
"https://smartarmstack.github.io/smart_arm_stack_ROS2/smartarmstack_lgpl.list"
sudo apt update
sudo apt-get install libmarinholab-sas-core

The package depends on libdqrobotics (from the DQ Robotics PPA, see Prerequisites) and installs the shared library, the headers under /usr/include/marinholab/sas/core/ and the CMake package configuration, so consumers can find_package(marinholab_sas_core). Keep it up to date with sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get upgrade libmarinholab-sas-core.

Building from source is described in Building (CMake); the full list of SmartArmStack packages is on smartarmstack.github.io.

Contents

• include/marinholab/sas/core/ — public C++ headers (namespace marinholab::sas::core).
• src/ — library implementation.
• examples/ — C++ example programs (built by default).
• docker/ — ubuntu:noble build environment and full test pipeline.
• debian/ — Debian packaging (native source package).
• tools/version.sh — rolling version computation.

The library depends on Eigen3 and dqrobotics.

Versioning

The project uses a rolling YY.MM.NN version:

• YY.MM — the current month (e.g. 26.09 for September 2026).
• NN — the number of commits since the version tag vYY.MM (e.g. v26.09); 00 when the tag does not exist yet.

The version is computed at build time by tools/version.sh; the first release after a new month starts at .00 and rolls forward with each commit.

Platform compatibility

• Ubuntu / Linux — full support, including the real-time scheduling (ThreadManager priorities, CPU affinity) and the SCHED_FIFO example.
• macOS — builds and runs. Real-time scheduling degrades gracefully: ThreadManager::apply_priority() / apply_cpu_affinity() are Linux-only (guarded by #ifdef __linux__), and the SCHED_FIFO example falls back to default scheduling.
• Windows — the library builds. The POSIX-only parts of ThreadManager are guarded, and the SCHED_FIFO example compiles to a no-op timing loop. Build dqrobotics from source with vcpkg (its CMake expects the vcpkg toolchain).

Note

The Debian package is only produced on Ubuntu. On macOS/Windows use CMake directly or FetchContent.

Building (CMake)

cmake -B build -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release
cmake --build build -j

• A shared library (libmarinholab_sas_core.so) is built by default (the standard CMake BUILD_SHARED_LIBS variable).
• For a static library instead: cmake -B build -DBUILD_SHARED_LIBS=OFF.
• Example executables are built by default; disable with -DMARINHO_LAB_SAS_CORE_BUILD_EXAMPLES=OFF.

Prerequisites

• Eigen3:
  • Ubuntu: apt-get install libeigen3-dev
  • macOS: brew install eigen
  • Windows: vcpkg install eigen3
• dqrobotics:
  • Ubuntu: from the DQ Robotics PPA (add-apt-repository ppa:dqrobotics-dev/development && apt-get install libdqrobotics)
  • macOS / Windows: build from dqrobotics/cpp with CMake (cmake -S cpp -B cpp/build && cmake --build cpp/build && cmake --install cpp/build)
• Note: the dqrobotics headers use <Eigen/Dense> without the eigen3/ prefix; if that does not resolve on your system, create the symlink ln -s /usr/include/eigen3/Eigen /usr/include/Eigen (Ubuntu only).

Using it from another CMake project

find_package(marinholab_sas_core REQUIRED)
target_link_libraries(your_target marinholab::sas::core)

#include <marinholab/sas/core/sas_clock.hpp>

marinholab::sas::core::Clock clock(0.01);

Or as a subdirectory / FetchContent dependency:

include(FetchContent)
FetchContent_Declare(
    marinholab_sas_core
    GIT_REPOSITORY https://github.com/MarinhoLab/sas_cpp.git
    GIT_TAG        main
)
FetchContent_MakeAvailable(marinholab_sas_core)

target_link_libraries(your_target marinholab::sas::core)

Examples

Run them after building (all are bounded; they exit on their own):

./build/sas_core_example
./build/sas_clock_example
./build/sas_clock_sched_fifo_example
./build/thread_manager_example
./build/sas_robot_driver_example

Debian package

Build the .deb with the usual command:

bash tools/bump-changelog.sh   # align the changelog with the rolling version
dpkg-buildpackage -us -uc -b

This produces ../libmarinholab-sas-core_<version>_<arch>.deb containing the shared library, the headers under /usr/include/marinholab/sas/core/ and the CMake package configuration under /usr/lib/cmake/marinholab_sas_core/, so installed consumers can find_package(marinholab_sas_core).

Docker

A full build-and-test environment on ubuntu:noble (CMake build, running all examples, the static-library toggle, and the Debian package) lives in docker/:

cd docker
docker compose run --rm marinholab_sas_core