RobotPerf: An Open-Source, Vendor-Agnostic, Benchmarking Suite for Evaluating Robotics Computing System Performance

TL;DR

RobotPerf is an open-source, vendor-neutral benchmarking suite for robotics computing systems that uses ROS 2 to evaluate hardware performance through black-box and grey-box testing methods, supporting diverse platforms.

Contribution

It introduces a comprehensive, adaptable benchmarking framework for robotics systems that is vendor-agnostic and integrates multiple testing approaches within ROS 2.

Findings

Provides standardized benchmarking tools for robotics hardware

Supports diverse hardware platforms and custom ROS 2 graphs

Facilitates community-driven development and evolution

Abstract

We introduce RobotPerf, a vendor-agnostic benchmarking suite designed to evaluate robotics computing performance across a diverse range of hardware platforms using ROS 2 as its common baseline. The suite encompasses ROS 2 packages covering the full robotics pipeline and integrates two distinct benchmarking approaches: black-box testing, which measures performance by eliminating upper layers and replacing them with a test application, and grey-box testing, an application-specific measure that observes internal system states with minimal interference. Our benchmarking framework provides ready-to-use tools and is easily adaptable for the assessment of custom ROS 2 computational graphs. Drawing from the knowledge of leading robot architects and system architecture experts, RobotPerf establishes a standardized approach to robotics benchmarking. As an open-source initiative, RobotPerf remains committed to evolving with community input to advance the future of hardware-accelerated robotics.