In the Metrics report released late last year , the top 40 most downloaded packages were mentioned, however, they are the default packages available with ROS distros. What is the right source for me to look for the most popular and commonly used ROS packages?
During my search, I came across a thread that stated that MoveIt is the 3rd most popular package. Is this from a report? If yes, please do share.
Secondly, I was looking at the OS related metrics for ROS2 here How do I interpret the popularity of Windows over Linux? Is the numbers skewed because ROS2 on Linux is installed via apt?
There’s no great way to determine what’s most commonly used. There’s only some indirect proxies.
Most Downloaded Packages is one way to measure, but that’s based on downloading package binaries from packages.ros.org, which not everyone does, and doesn’t count if you downloaded from source. The website only lists the top ten for aesthetic reasons. I could post the current full list if desired.
The Repos Table sorts based on Github metrics (forks/stars/subs)
The ROS2 data was discussed on Discourse previously. I cannot speak to the difference between these numbers and the ones from packages.ros.org. If there are different ways of visualizing this data could be useful, please let me know by opening an issue
Also won’t count docker or snap containers distributed for production.
I’d also be interested in having an annual complete list or adding to your metrics repo table. Though on the bottom of the page it says: “the most downloaded packages introduced in each year”. I’m more interested in the top packages of the year regardless of their introduction, though having a top-10 of new things is a nice metric too!
5308 packages in total. Fun fact: I’m responsible for one of the least downloaded packages ever: joint-state-publisher-js
For the latter, I opened a ticket to make a separate page for that. I had a vague memory of the top packages not changing too much, but that might have been from before I got the expanded logs. There’s definitely some variability. I’ve been looking at zingchart for displaying a couple of unique types of data, like these rankings and the country rankings
This data is surprisingly interesting. @Katherine_Scott maybe something to play with your data science skills.
I’m surprised how high up some of the ROS2 stuff is given ROS1 has a 8 year head start.
This could make for some nice superlatives. Of the packages I made alone, my lowest is ros2 ouster with 26 binary installs. Which is surprising to me knowing some folks that use it its that low. But its in the lowest 3.6% of installs (but hopefully growing). My highest is STVL in the top 20% with nearly 16k.
This has some really interesting insights in it - like I’m seeing grid-maps scattered pretty high all over the place. This was an area I was interested in and migrating some elements of it to Navigation2, but it seems I’m late to the game, everyone else is already doing it!