Skip to main content

​
Foxglove Studio

Foxglove Studio is a browser-based tool for visualizing ROS 2 data. The ADOS agent runs a foxglove_bridge server on port 8766 that streams topic data over WebSocket. You can view IMU plots, GPS tracks, camera feeds, and custom topics without installing anything.

​
Connecting

​
From the GCS

The ROS tab Overview sub-view includes an embedded Foxglove panel. It connects automatically when the ROS environment is running. Click the fullscreen button to expand it.

​
From Foxglove Studio (browser)

  1. Go to app.foxglove.dev
  2. Click Open connection
  3. Select Foxglove WebSocket
  4. Enter your drone’s address: ws://drone-ip:8766 (LAN) or wss://ros-{id}.altnautica.com (cloud)

​
From Foxglove Studio (desktop app)

Download from foxglove.dev/download. Same connection flow as the browser version, but with faster rendering and local file playback.

​
What you can visualize

Panel TypeTopicsUse Case
Plot/mavros/imu/dataAttitude angles, angular velocities over time
3D/mavros/local_position/pose, TF treeDrone position in 3D space
Map/mavros/global_position/globalGPS track on a map
Gauge/mavros/batteryVoltage, current, percentage
State/mavros/stateArmed/disarmed, flight mode
Image/camera/image_rawLive camera feed
Diagnostics/mavros/bridge/healthBridge connection health
Log/mavros/statustext/recvFlight controller warnings and errors

​
Recording data

MCAP is the standard recording format for ROS 2 data. You can start and stop recordings from the GCS Recordings sub-view, the CLI, or the REST API.

​
From the CLI

# Record all topics
ados ros record

# Record specific topics for 5 minutes
ados ros record --topics /mavros/imu/data /camera/image_raw --duration 300

​
From the REST API

curl -X POST http://localhost:8080/api/ros/recording/start \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"topics": ["/mavros/imu/data"], "max_duration_s": 600}'

​
Rotation policy

The agent keeps the 10 most recent recordings and caps total disk usage at 5 GB. Older recordings are deleted automatically. You can download recordings from the GCS Recordings sub-view before they rotate out.

​
Playing back recordings

Open an MCAP file in Foxglove Studio to replay the data as if the drone were flying. This is useful for debugging algorithms, reviewing flights, and sharing data with teammates.
  1. Download the MCAP file from the GCS Recordings sub-view
  2. Open Foxglove Studio
  3. Click Open local file and select the .mcap file

​
Configuration

The foxglove_bridge server is configured through the agent:
SettingDefaultDescription
ros.foxglove_port8766WebSocket port for Foxglove connections
Send buffer100 MBMaximum buffered data before dropping slow clients
Worker threads2Threads handling WebSocket connections
EncodingCBOR/CDRBinary encoding, 10-20x faster than JSON for image topics
Port 8766 is used because the agent’s MAVLink WebSocket proxy already occupies port 8765.