Quick Start

Get started with ATLAS, TALOS, and HERMES after installation. Start the core GVA services, launch the HMI, explore the demos, and write your own DDS client with the LDM SDK.

Quick Start

Get up and running with the Astute Systems GVA product line in minutes.

This guide assumes you've already installed one or more product lines via apt (see Installation) — everything runs from installed binaries and systemd units, there is nothing to build.

Prerequisites

  • [x] Installed a product line — atlas, talos, and/or hermes (Installation Guide)
  • [x] Configured your licence, if you're also using ldmx or bohemian (Licensing Guide)

Starting the Core Services

ATLAS ships three service daemons that most GVA applications depend on: the Registry, Alarms, and UACM services. Start the Registry first, since the others depend on it:

sudo systemctl start gva-registry.service
sudo systemctl start gva-alarms.service
sudo systemctl start gva-uacm.service

Enable them to start automatically on boot:

sudo systemctl enable gva-registry.service gva-alarms.service gva-uacm.service

Check status or logs for any service:

systemctl status gva-registry.service
journalctl -u gva-registry.service -n 50 --no-pager

See ATLAS Services Overview for what each service does.

Running the HMI

The GVA HMI is the ATLAS crew-station display. It needs a graphical session (X11/Wayland), so it isn't started automatically by default — launch it directly, or via its service unit:

gva-hmi

sudo systemctl start gva-hmi.service

Useful flags:

gva-hmi --area=4    # Start on SYS screen
gva-hmi -a 5        # Start on DRV screen

See ATLAS HMI for the full functional-area reference.

Running TALOS (BMS)

sudo systemctl start gva-tile-server.service   # offline map tiles
gva-app-bms --domain=0

See TALOS for map sources and offline-caching details.

Running HERMES (VoIP)

sudo systemctl start gva-voip-server.service
gva-voip-client --user=operator1 --server=127.0.0.1

See HERMES for the full VoIP/AI voice-agent setup.

Exploring the Demos

A set of arcade-style demonstration applications (Drone Invaders, Defense Grid Run, Shield Protocol) exercise the full GVA stack end-to-end and are a good way to see registration, alarms, and DDS traffic in action. They ship in the atlas-demos package:

sudo apt install atlas-demos
gva-app-drone-invaders

See Examples for a walkthrough of each demo.

Writing Your Own Application

To build a GVA-compliant DDS client of your own, install the LDM SDK:

sudo apt install ldm-sdk

This gives you the LDM 10.0.0 IDL headers, the AstuteDDS runtime, ldmx/bohemian diagnostic tools, and a set of source-only examples installed under /usr/share/ldm-sdk/examples/ covering registration, the registry, alarms, and UACM.

See the SDK Reference for the full examples index and a minimal CMakeLists.txt you can copy to build against ldm-sdk.

DDS Domain

All applications on the same vehicle must use the same DDS domain ID, passed via --domain=<N> (default 0):

gva-registry --domain=0
gva-hmi --domain=0

If applications on the same domain aren't seeing each other, the domain ID is the first thing to check.

Next Steps