0.8.1

The 20230403 release, which corresponds to Python SDK 0.8.1, brings a few breaking changes. The changes and how to mitigate them are summarized here.

Default Metadata Format

The default output format for the metadata has changed from the legacy to the non-legacy format. However, the SDK continues to read the legacy format, and will therefore continue to able to read old recorded data.

To continue to output the legacy format with C++, set the parameter legacy to true when calling the get_metadata function.

To continue to output the legacy format with Python, set the parameter _legacy_format to True when instantiating a Sensor.

If you find that you have written data out in the non-legacy format and you wish to use the legacy format instead, use the provided Python utility convert-meta-to-legacy:

convert-meta-to-legacy </path/to/metadata/json> </path/to/desired/output/json>

LidarScan deprecations

A number of long-deprecated members of the LidarScan interface have been removed. These are:

LidarScan::N_FIELDS: The number of fields in a profile has varied since the introduction of eUDP profiles in FW 2.2. To find the number of fields in your scan, we suggest using the iterator to loop over and count the number of fields.

LidarScan::Field: use sensor::ChanField instead.
LidarScan::BlockHeader: BlockHeaders, structs consisting of the timestamp, encoder ticks, and status which corresponded to a single column of measurements (identifiable by``measurement_id``), were deprecated in favor of Headers, which are Eigen Arrays of length equivalent to the # of columns in a scan, with the ith element being the value from the ith measurement. As such, where once you might write:
    auto n_invalid = std::count_if( scans[i].headers.begin(), scans[i].headers.end(), [](const
    LidarScan::BlockHeader& h) { return h.status != 0xffffffff; });

you should now use the ``status()`` function::

    auto status = scan.status();
    auto n_invalid = std::count_if(status.data(), status.data() + status.size(), [](const uint32_t s) { return !(s & 0x01); });

Timestamps are now available through ``timestamp()``, also returning a ``Header``; and the
information contained in ``encoder`` is available through ``measurement_id()`` (see the next
line item for the conversion).
encoder: Encoder counts were part of the LEGACY UDP profile, representing the azimuth angle as a raw encoder count starting from 0 to a max value of 90111. It thus incremented 44 ticks per azimuth angle in 2048 mode, 88 ticks in 1024 mode and 176 in 512 mode. To recover encoder infcount, you can multiply the measurement_id by the number dictated by your lidar mode. We suggest, however, migrating to use simply measurement_id and multiplying by 360 degrees/ N where N is the number of columns in your mode (512, 1024, 2048) when you need the azimuth, thus untying any sense of azimuth from the internal mechanicals of the Ouster sensor.

Notes for the future

For customers who know they will continue to upgrade their version of the SDK, we also wish to highlight some upcoming breaking changes.

Dropped Support

Python

Python 3.7 reaches its end of life on June 27th, 2023. We will likely stop producing Python 3.7 ouster-sdk wheels by November 2023.

FW versions

FW 2.0 will be 3 years old in November 2023, with numerous upgrades introduces in subsequent FWs 2.1-2.5, and FW 3.0. New versions of the Python SDK and new commits of ouster_example will likely stop supporting direct communication with sensors running FW 2.0 by November 2023, although recorded data in the pcap+json format will continue to be read and supported.

Ubuntu 18.04

Ubuntu 18.04 reaches its end of standard support in May 2023. We will likely stop supporting the C++ and Python builds of ouster_example on 18.04 by November 2023. You will still be able to run available Python wheels on your system if you so choose.

ROS

As already announced in the ouster-ros repo, there will no longer be ROS melodic support past its End of Life in May 2023.

Future Dropped Support

Looking forward, we will be dropping support for Python versions, Ubuntu versions, and ROS distros as they reach their end of standard support instead of supporting them past with a grace period. This means, for instance, that we will stop supporting Ubuntu 20.04 in April 2025 and Python 3.8 in October 2024.

FW deprecations, current and upcoming

FW 2.5

There is no need to upgrade to this latest release of the SDK in order to work with sensors running the new FW 2.5 if you already updated to 20230114/0.7.1. However, please note that the default value of udp_profile_lidar has been updated to the Single Return profile (RNG19_RFL8_SIG15_NIR16) from the legacy profile (LEGACY). The legacy profile is still supported, but you will have to change your sensor default via its configuration webpage or the HTTP or TCP APIs.

Future

We will discuss future FW removals and deprecations and their impact if you are a user of the SDK.

TCP API

The planned removal of the TCP API in future firmwares should not affect SDK users who communciate with the sensor only through SDK APIs, as we have already updated our code to use the HTTP API where it is available.

LEGACY Profile

The planned removal of the LEGACY profile in future firmwares also should not affect SDK users, as it will just be a code pathway not used.