Getting Started

Before you can build and run the MRover codebase, you need a working development environment. There are two paths, and you should choose based on your hardware, subteam, experience level, and preferences.

Native ROS Installation - Official

Ubuntu 24.04 LTS or Kubuntu 24.04 LTS running natively is the only officially supported path. If you’re setting up a personal laptop for MRover or working on rover hardware, Ubuntu is highly recommended.

Portable ROS Installation - Unofficial

Runs the codebase through a pixi-managed environment on macOS or another Linux distribution that is not Ubuntu 24. Current supported distribution families include:

Debian
Fedora
Archlinux

You can therefore use any of those distributions or a distribution derived from them, eg. CachyOS, Linux Mint, etc. (package manager has to be one of apt, dnf, or pacman)

This path is maintained by software leadership and is best-effort only. Do NOT use it if your work involves rover hardware. Use it if you are on autonomy, drone, or teleop, you are experienced with linux, know how to manage dependencies and environments, and have a real reason to dislike Ubuntu.