ROS by Example, A Do-It-Yourself Guide to the Robot Operating System

This book is about programming your robot to do amazing things, whether it be
detecting people's faces and other visual objects, navigating autonomously around your
house, or responding to spoken commands. We will be using some of the most
advanced robotics software available today thanks to ROS, the Robot Operating System
created by California-based Willow Garage and now maintained by the Open Source
Robotics Foundation (OSRF).
The primary goal of ROS (pronounced "Ross") is to provide a unified and open source
programming framework for controlling robots in a variety of real world and simulated
environments.