Write and deploy code to control your machine

1. Install an SDK

The easiest way to get started is to go to the Code sample page of the CONNECT tab on your machine’s page in the Viam app.

Follow the instructions there to install your preferred Viam SDK on your Linux or macOS development machine or single-board computer:

python3 -m venv .venv
source .venv/bin/activate
pip install viam-sdk

pip install 'viam-sdk[mlmodel]'

go get go.viam.com/rdk/robot/client

npm install @viamrobotics/sdk

flutter pub add viam_sdk

2. Copy the connection code

With the SDK installed, copy the code sample from the Code sample page of the CONNECT tab on your machine’s page.

The sample code will show you how to authenticate and connect to a machine, as well as some of the methods you can use on your configured components and services.

You can run this code directly on the machine or from a separate computer.

3. Use component and service APIs

Viam’s APIs are standardized across all models of a given component or service. This means that regardless of the configured hardware, you use the same APIs.

For example, you can send the same SetPower command to any kind of motor, using any of the available SDKs:

my_motor = Motor.from_robot(robot=robot, name="my_motor")
# Set the power to 40% forwards.
await my_motor.set_power(power=0.4)

myMotorComponent, err := motor.FromRobot(machine, "my_motor")
// Set the motor power to 40% forwards.
myMotorComponent.SetPower(context.Background(), 0.4, nil)

final base = Motor.fromRobot(client, "my_motor");
// Set the power to  40% forwards.
await myMotor.setPower(0.4);

const myMotor = new VIAM.MotorClient(client, "my_motor");
// Set the power to  40% forwards.
await myMotor.setPower(0.4);

std::shared_ptr<Motor> motor = robot->resource_by_name<Motor>("my_motor");
// Set the power to  40% forwards.
motor->set_power(0.4);

See component APIs and service APIs for a full list of available API methods.

1. Run code remotely or on your machine

You can run the code to control your machine on any computer where you have an SDK installed.

If the computer that viam-server runs on has enough compute power, you can also configure your machine to run your code as a managed process whenever it boots. See Processes for more information.

2. (Recommended) Wrap your code in a module

Once you have written code to control your machine and tested it, you can then wrap your custom functionality by creating a module. In wrapping your code into a module, you will be able to:

• deploy it across one or more machines
• use it in fragments
• version it

You can package any files, code, or executable into a module. When you add a module to your machine’s configuration, the entrypoint defined for the module is run which can start your code.

If the code you have written augments what a component does, such as, for example, adding an overlay to a camera stream, you can create your own camera model inside your module and amend the API methods to have your custom functionality. For an example of this, see the facial-detection module which wraps its logic into a custom vision service.

If your functionality does not conform to existing API types such as the motor or camera API, you can use a generic API to wrap your code.

For more information, see How to create and deploy a new module.