CATKIN_WS (ROS 1 only)

The path to the root of the catkin workspace. The Formant agent uses this to find custom ROS 1 message definitions.

COLCON_WS (ROS 2 only)

Absolute path to the colcon workspace for custom ROS 2 message definitions.

FORMANT_AGENT_PYTHON_PATH

python

The file location of the Python interpreter used by the tf2 bridge.

FORMANT_OVERRIDE_TIMESTAMP

false

Enables replacement of timestamps on ROS messages with the current time.

FORMANT_ROS_BRIDGE_NAME

ROS 1: formant_ros_bridge

ROS 2: formant_ros2_bridge

Set a custom name for the ROS node.

FORMANT_ROS_VERSION

1 or 2: sets the ROS version for the agent.

ROS_MASTER_URI

http://localhost:11311

The address of the ROS master to which the Formant ROS Bridge connects.

SOURCE_SCRIPT

The agent will source this script before running. Useful to set environment variables, etc.

If the ROS setup files are not in <catkin_ws>/devel/setup.bash, the custom location of ROS setup script.

FORMANT_AGENT_GRPC_PORT

5501

The port where the Formant Agent will expose the gRPC interface.

FORMANT_AGENT_GRPC_UNIX_SOCKET

/var/lib/formant/agent.sock

The Unix Socket where the Formant Agent will start its server.

FORMANT_AGENT_HTTP_PORT

5502

The port where the Formant Agent will expose the HTTP interface.

FORMANT_AGENT_IP

localhost

The IP address where the Formant Agent will start it's server.

FORMANT_AGENT_PYTHON3_PATH

python3

The file location of the python3 interpreter used by the ROS bridge and media encoder.

FORMANT_AGENT_SERVER_CERT

File location of the TLS cert.

FORMANT_AGENT_SERVER_KEY

File location of the TLS key

FORMANT_DEBUG

false

Enables debug logs.

FORMANT_DISABLE_PYTHON

false

Disables all python subprocesses for the agent. This includes the media encoder, ROS bridge, and ROS TF bridge. Since the media encoder is a python subprocess, disabling python will disable all video and audio encoding.

FORMANT_DISABLE_STANDARD_HOST_METRICS

false

Disables the automatic collection and ingestion of default telemetry streams, such as CPU, memory, and IP-based location.

FORMANT_DISABLE_SYSINFO

false

Disables system information collection. (Used for NVIDIA containers).

FORMANT_DISABLE_TEGRA_STATS

false

Disables the automatic collection and ingestion of default telemetry streams specific to Tegra systems. Jetson products (Nano, Xavier, etc.) are Tegra systems.

FORMANT_DISABLE_TERMINAL

false

Disables the web terminal feature that allows users to run a shell through the agent.

FORMANT_MEMORY_STATS

false

Used to monitor ROS 1 bridge performance.

If FORMANT_PYTHON_GC_COLLECT is set to force, and this variable is set to true, garbage collection statistics from the ROS 1 bridge will be printed in the Formant agent log.

FORMANT_NAME

Name of the Formant Agent, used to override Agent name during provisioning.

FORMANT_POLL_FILE_TAILING

When FORMANT_POLL_FILE_TAILING is set to true, file tail streams will ingest from any file with the file name specified, even if the original file is renamed and a new file is created with the same name.

When FORMANT_POLL_FILE_TAILING is set to false, file tail streams will follow the original file specified, even if it is later renamed.

FORMANT_PORT_FORWARDING

true

Enables the local port forwarding feature.

FORMANT_PROVISIONING_TOKEN

Formant provisioning token used to provision an agent.

FORMANT_PYTHON_GC_COLLECT

force

When set to force, ROS 1 bridge will run a Python garbage collection routine at the interval set by FORMANT_PYTHON_GC_INTERVAL.

When set to auto, the Python garbage collector will run automatically according to its own parameters.

If FORMANT_MEMORY_STATS is set to true, statistics from this process will be printed to the Formant agent log.

FORMANT_PYTHON_GC_INTERVAL

600

If FORMANT_PYTHON_GC_COLLECT is set to true, ROS 1 bridge will run a Python garbage collection routine at this interval (seconds).

FORMANT_TERMINAL_BUFFER_SIZE

40000

Size in bytes of the terminal buffer.

FORMANT_UPLOAD_DEBUG_OUTPUT

false

Enables the uploading of debug logs when the environment is not production.

STALE_MESSAGE_MS

Timeout for teleoperation messages. Messages which are older than the timeout are deemed 'stale' and disregarded.

For example, if you set STALE_MESSAGE_MS to 10, but have a ping of 50 ms to your device, all messages will be thrown out, because they will be older than the 10 ms limit.

WEBRTC_INTERFACE

N/A

Set the network interface to connect via webRTC

FORMANT_ACCELERATED_VIDEO_ENCODING

true

Enables jetson hardware accelerated encoding of video.

FORMANT_ACCELERATED_ENCODE_SPEED_PRESET

1

The speed-preset for Jetson hardware-accelerated video encoding. Values are in the range [0,4].

FORMANT_ALLOW_H264_SOURCE

false

If other pixel formats do not work well, allow H264 to also be chosen. This will be true if FORMANT_PREFER_H264_SOURCE is also true.

FORMANT_AUDIO_BITRATE

96k

Desired bitrate of uploaded audio.

FORMANT_AUDIO_NUM_CHANNELS

1

Number of channels of the audio device.

FORMANT_AUDIO_USE_FILTER

true

Use anlmdn filter on audio to reduce noise.

FORMANT_AUDIO_SAMPLE_FORMAT

s16le

Sample format of the audio device.

FORMANT_AUDIO_SAMPLE_RATE

16000

Sample rate of audio device's signal.

FORMANT_DISABLE_RESIZE_VIDEO

false

Disable Formant agent resizing the aspect ratio of the video.

FORMANT_ENABLE_ADAPTIVE_BITRATE

true

Allow Formant to automatically reduce the video bitrate if network degradation is detected during teleoperation. Note: this will also affect encoding for telemetry streams.

FORMANT_ENABLE_ENCODER_STATS

false

Adds encoder statistics to Formant agent logs.

Experimental feature.

FORMANT_ENCODE_SPEED_PRESET

"ultrafast"

Set the quality/speed tradeoff with GStreamer speed preset (corresponds to the enum GstX264EncPreset).

Options from fastest (least CPU time) to slowest (highest quality):
"ultrafast"
"superfast"
"veryfast"
"faster"
"fast"
"medium"
"slow"
"slower"
"veryslow"

FORMANT_ENCODING_BITRATE

512

Overrides the bitrate (Kbps) of all agent-encoded video streams.

FORMANT_ENCODING_BUFFER_SIZE

30

Set the Video Buffering Verifier buffer size in milliseconds.

This is used to control the maximum bitrate that the encoder can produce at any given time. The default of 30 milliseconds favors a stricter control suitable for high bitrate and framerate. Shorter buffer times may allow for more consistent throughput, while being more vulnerable to network spikes.

FORMANT_FLV_DECODE

true

Decode RTMP stream as FLV (Turn off if RTMP stream isn't working, usually because it has an audio stream).

FORMANT_FORCE_ACCELERATED_VIDEO_ENCODING

false

If the Jetson accelerated encoder crashes, the Formant agent will turn it off. Set this to true to prevent this and keep retrying with acceleration.

FORMANT_FORCE_ALLOW_PICAM

false

Enable use of Picam on Raspberry Pi or Jetson

FORMANT_FRAMERATE_CAP

24

Formant's encoder will not output frames at a rate higher than the frame rate cap.

If the hardware source is greater than this value, Formant will re-encode it to this value.

FORMANT_GST_INFO

false

Enable log info for GStreamer.

FORMANT_KEY_FRAME_INTERVAL

10

Interval in frames at which the encoder should insert full frames into output video.

If you are experiencing blocky or glitchy video, consider decreasing this interval. This will transmit full frames more frequently. This may increase data consumption.

FORMANT_LOW_BANDWIDTH_BITRATE

64

Bitrate to set video to when low bandwidth mode is enabled.

FORMANT_OVERRIDE_AUDIO_CONFIGURATION

false

Override audio configuration with provided values.

FORMANT_OVERRIDE_BITRATE

false

Override video bitrate from configuration.

FORMANT_PREFER_H264_SOURCE

false

Receive h264 video directly from hardware camera if offered.

FORMANT_PREFER_MJPG

false

Prefer the MJPG hardware video stream, if there is one. Typically, MJPG will be the last choice.

FORMANT_RTSP_BUFFER_LENGTH

0

Length in ms of RTSP buffer. Increase this to add stability to RTSP video (at cost of latency).

FORMANT_RTSP_PROTOCOLS

'"udp+tcp"'

Protocol for RTSP stream. Choose udp, tcp or udp+tcp.

FORMANT_TARGET_FRAMERATE

30

Target framerate for hardware video streams.

FORMANT_USE_RTP_JITTER_BUFFER

false

Enables use of jitter buffer (debug only).

FORMANT_VIDEO_FRAMERATE

24

Assumed framerate of video, if framerate cannot be determined from source.

FORMANT_VIDEO_GST_STRING

" ! clockoverlay"

Overlay a timestamp and other GStreamer strings on your video stream

FORMANT_VIDEO_PASS

0 (or "cbr")

Sets the 'rate control' of the video encoder. Corresponds to the enum "GstX264EncPass".

If it is "cbr", "pass1", "pass2", or "pass3", then the bitrate that is specified (either by FORMANT_OVERRIDE_BITRATE or by Formant) will be the target bitrate. See this page for more details.

FORMANT_VIDEO_QUANTIZER

21

If using "quant" (4) or "qual" (5) above, then this will be the parameter passed to the quantizer. See the documentation here for more details.

FORMANT_X264ENC_PARAMS

''

Override Formant's standard x264enc encoder parameters.

Refer to x264enc documentation .