k: Kinematics library for rust-lang

k has below functionalities.

1. Forward kinematics
2. Inverse kinematics
3. URDF Loader

k uses nalgebra as math library.

See Document and examples/ for more details.

Requirements to build examples

sudo apt install g++ cmake xorg-dev libglu1-mesa-dev

IK example with GUI

cargo run --release --example interactive_ik

Push below keys to move the end of the manipulator.

• f: forward
• b: backward
• p: up
• n: down
• l: left
• r: right
• z: reset the manipulator state.

Create link tree from urdf and solve IK

use k::prelude::*;

fn main() {
    // Load urdf file
    let chain = k::Chain::<f32>::from_urdf_file("urdf/sample.urdf").unwrap();
    println!("chain: {chain}");

    // Set initial joint angles
    let angles = vec![0.2, 0.2, 0.0, -1.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.2, 0.2, 0.0, -1.0, 0.0, 0.0];

    chain.set_joint_positions(&angles).unwrap();
    println!("initial angles={:?}", chain.joint_positions());

    let target_link = chain.find("l_wrist_pitch").unwrap();

    // Get the transform of the end of the manipulator (forward kinematics)
    chain.update_transforms();
    let mut target = target_link.world_transform().unwrap();

    println!("initial target pos = {}", target.translation);
    println!("move z: +0.1");
    target.translation.vector.z += 0.1;

    // Create IK solver with default settings
    let solver = k::JacobianIkSolver::default();

    // Create a set of joints from end joint
    let arm = k::SerialChain::from_end(target_link);
    // solve and move the manipulator angles
    solver.solve(&arm, &target).unwrap();
    println!("solved angles={:?}", chain.joint_positions());

    chain.update_transforms();
    let solved_pose = target_link.world_transform().unwrap();
    println!("solved target pos = {}", solved_pose.translation);
}

Structure of API

Top level interface is Chain struct. It contains Nodes and they have the relations between nodes (parent/children). Actual data (joint angle(position), transform between nodes) is stored in Joint object inside nodes.

You can get local/world transform of nodes. See below figure to understand what is the node's local_transform() and world_transform().

OpenRR Community

Here is a discord server for OpenRR users and developers.