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Tutorial 1: Setup#

This tutorial runs in NVIDIA Isaac Sim with the Inspire Hand USD asset. Complete the following setup before starting the tutorials in this series.

Learning Objectives#

In this tutorial, you will:

  • Understand the hardware and software requirements for the OpenUSD and Tuning Best Practices series.

  • Download the course USD files from Content to a local directory /path/to/Inspire/.

  • Open the starting Inspire Hand scene in Isaac Sim.

Prerequisites#

  • Basic familiarity with USD and Isaac Sim (stage, prims, layers).

  • Understanding of rigid-body physics (mass, inertia, joints) is helpful but not required.

Get the Course USD Files#

In the file paths used in this tutorial series, replace /path/to with the directory that contains your copied Inspire folder.

  1. In the Content browser, go to IsaacSim/Samples/Rigging/Inspire/.

  2. In the Content browser, right-click on the Inspire folder and select “Download” to save it to your local machine. Place the downloaded folder so that its path is /path/to/Inspire/, replacing /path/to with your chosen directory.

Downloading the Inspire folder from the Content browser in Isaac Sim

In the Content browser, right-click the Inspire folder and select “Download” to save the course files locally.#

Within /path/to/Inspire/, the course files are organized into multiple checkpoint folders:

  • /path/to/Inspire/module_1_start — Initial Inspire Hand USD inspire_hand.usda.

  • /path/to/Inspire/module_3_end-checkpoint_1 — Checkpoint with collision filters configured.

  • /path/to/Inspire/module_4_end-checkpoint_2 — Checkpoint with mimic joints, joint drive maximums, and tuned gains for the finger joints configured.

  • /path/to/Inspire/module_5_end-checkpoint_3 — Checkpoint with all finger and thumb joint gains tuned and authored.

Open the Starting Scene#

  1. Open /path/to/Inspire/module_1_start/inspire_hand.usda in Isaac Sim.

  2. Select the inspire_hand prim.

Summary#

This tutorial covered:

  • Where the samples live in Content and how to copy them so the course root is /path/to/Inspire/.

  • How the checkpoint folders are laid out under /path/to/Inspire/.

  • How to open the starting Inspire Hand scene in Isaac Sim.

Next Steps#

Continue to Tutorial 2: Asset Structure to learn the USD Asset Structure 3.0 layout for the Inspire Hand.