build: install ROS before attempting to publish the rosidl_runtime_rs crate

[esteve]

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[esteve]

@jhdcs @maspe36 I don't know if it'd be better to only build the generate_docs feature (which contains a shim of the rcl functions) or do it like this PR and install ROS before attempting to release the crate. Let me know what you think.

[maspe36]

So on one hand, if we use the generate_docs feature we would presumably finish CI faster, which in general is nice. But I feel like especially for a release we should try and be as faithful as possible with our intended users environment.

To me, this makes sense to install ROS. As an aside, what version of ROS is installed?

[esteve]

So on one hand, if we use the generate_docs feature we would presumably finish CI faster, which in general is nice. But I feel like especially for a release we should try and be as faithful as possible with our intended users environment.

On the one hand, we only do that once per release, so not a big deal if it takes a bit longer. On the other hand, we already build rclrs for every supported ROS distro when we merge a PR and periodically, so not sure if it's needed for a release in the end. I'd rename generate_docs to something more descriptive for this use case (e.g. build_for_release)

As an aside, what version of ROS is installed?

Actually none, I thought setup-ros would install the latest distro, but turns out that unless the required-ros-distributions option is passed, it just installs the ROS build tools.

[jhdcs]

I would agree that renaming generate_docs to something more descriptive would be a good idea. Apart from that, though, I'm afraid I don't have much of an opinion - this is a little outside my normal area of expertise...

[maspe36]

Actually none, I thought setup-ros would install the latest distro, but turns out that unless the required-ros-distributions option is passed, it just installs the ROS build tools.

If that's the case then lets just go with this approach

[esteve]

If that's the case then lets just go with this approach

@maspe36 do you mean installing ROS or releasing with the generate_docs (or a better name) feature on?

[maspe36]

Sorry I should've been more clear, lets just do what you're doing already in this PR and install ROS before attempting to release the crate. Either way though, we probably should rename generate_docs to something like no_ros etc

[esteve]

@maspe36 I've been thinking about the approach in this PR and it think it's not the right one, we could install all the supported ROS distros before release, but in the end we can only publish once and we're already testing all the ROS distros in our regular CI. I'm closing in favor of #14, which renames genrate_docs to use_ros_shim and tells release-plz to only use that feature when publishing to crates.io.

Thanks for reviewing the changes in this PR, can you have a look at #14 ?