Question about interacting with ICAROUS about icarous

[SweeWarman]

I don't see any attachment. I'm not sure how you are using ICAROUS. Are you running ICAROUS with the arducopter software in the loop (SITL) simulator or are you connecting ICAROUS to the pixhawk? Regardless, to interact with ICAROUS, ICAROUS must first connect to either an autopilot (arducopter) or the SITL.

ICAROUS is not a substitute for an autopilot. ICAROUS only provides planning and decision making functionality to make UAVs more autonomous. ICAROUS depends on an autopilot to perform the inner loop control (attitude control) and stabilization.

[FabianSchuessler]

If you have ICAROUS and arducopter installed on a drone, how do you connect both or verify the connection?

Edit: (Sorry if I hijack this issue.)

Can I use the long MISSION_START command to test if ICAROUS and ardupilot are connected? I assume because I get different feedback depending on if ICAROUS is running on the drone, this means both are connected. I also assume

result: 4

means command is not supported.

If ICAROUS is not running:

Got MAVLink msg: COMMAND_ACK {command : 300, result : 4}

If ICAROUS is running:

APM: IC:No Flight Plan loaded

[aogrcs]

@SweeWarman sorry for the attachment, I would attach it tomorrow. I think I misunderstand the guide. Do you mean that ICAROUS should work with SITL or an hardware of ArduCopter? Thanks
@FabianSchuessler I do not have a drone having both ICAROUS and ArduCopter. Your work is very appreciated and if I got such a drone, I should do as you do. Hope for more detailed information. Thanks
Sincerely

[aogrcs]

@SweeWarman This is the attachment. I thought that I could only use runGS.sh or runSITL.sh to simulate both ICAROUS and ArduCopter! This is completely wrong! Thanks

[SweeWarman]

@FabianSchuessler If ICAROUS is connected to a drone, and assuming your ground station has a radio connection to the companion computer on which ICAROUS is running and all the port settings in the ardupilot app have been configured appropriately, you should be able to receive telemetry on your ground station. This is an indication that ICAROUS is working. ICAROUS reroutes telemetry packets from the pixhawk to the ground station via the companion computer:

Pixhawk <-> (telem2 serial port) <-> ICAROUS (on companion computer) <-> radio connected to companion computer <-> ground station.

Also, if you have a terminal connected to the companion computer, when you launch ICAROUS, you should see a status message saying "Connection to autopilot established" on the terminal where you launch icarous with core-cpu1.

[aogrcs]

@SweeWarman Thanks for your explanation.