How to use DART through Gazebo?

In order to use DART, a full compilation of Gazebo from source is needed. The install instruction can be found in Gazebo website. Once gazebo is built from source and installed, we can run Gazebo with DART engine in two ways:

  • Specify DART as physics engine when run gazebo:

    gazebo -e dart

  • Load a world (SDFormat) file specified DART as physics engine:

    [dart_example.world]
<?xml version="1.0"?>
<sdf version="1.5">
  <world name="fluid_world">
    <physics type="dart">
      ...
    </physics>

    gazebo worlds/dart_example.world

Which mesh file formats can be loaded via .skel files?

DART uses assimp to import mesh files. Any formats supported by assimp can be loaded.