anafi_ros: from Off-the-Shelf Drones to Research Platforms

The off-the-shelf drones are simple to operate and easy to maintain aerial systems. However, due to proprietary flight software, these drones usually do not provide an open-source interface which can enable them for autonomous flight in research or teaching. This work introduces a package for ROS1 and ROS2 for straightforward interfacing with off-the-shelf drones from the Parrot ANAFI family. The developed ROS package is hardware agnostic, allowing connecting seamlessly to all four supported drone models. This framework can connect with the same ease to a single drone or a team of drones from the same ground station. The developed package was intensively tested at the limits of the drones’ capabilities and thoughtfully documented to facilitate its use by other research groups.