Thanks to opensource community, issue with NEXTAGE Open software (3D model geometry, tf) got resolved promptly

(From TORK's blog)

A user reported an issue in tf with NEXTAGE Open software that got resolved in a quick fashion thanks to opensource collaboration across organizations/userbases. Binaries (the ones installable by apt-get) including the fix is already available online. Please see more detail of the issue and how to apply the fix this ticket on github.
We, TORK, thinks without any doubts that the big advantage of making software public is that you get testers from across the globe. The fix this time is a true realization of this opensource dogma; if I review the ticketed report for this issue on github now, you’ll see the flow:

• A user reported the issue.
• –> Someone from robot’s manufacturor gave a comment.
• –> Another heavy user commented.
• –> Maintainer (us) created a fix candidate.
• –> Reporter user tested fix candidate and confirmed that it fixes.
• –> Maintainer pulled in the fix.

At least four persons from different organizations contributed so far up to this point, within only a week timeframe. And everybody is not obligated to this ticket (but us).
Going further, once the fix is pulled then it’s also important to make the fix easily accessible by the users. Having them as binary form is the way to go. We do that by relying on the platform the ROS maintenance team (OSRF) runs, as have we already done so. Steps for that is really simple (*1)：

• Submit a request for generating a binary (submission from this time)
• –> Announcement by OSRF that the binaries are ready (announcement made this time by OSRF)

TORK believes that opensource software development contributes to improving quality and fastening the engineering cycle for the corporations. That’s why we have and will continue contribution to the opensource community.

*1 Initial release takes a bit more steps. But once done so it’s really easy!