State of Turtlebot simulation using Gazebo in fuerte and groovy

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Note: This post could both be posted to ROS or Gazebo Q/A, but it is mainly related to the state of a ROS package (turtlebot_gazebo), so I figured it makes sense to post it here.

We successfully used Turtlebot simulation using Gazebo in electric for a some projects a few months ago. Coming back to try it using fuerte and groovy, it seems that the turtlebot_simulator package is in a sad state for both releases. In fuerte, spamming the console with

Warning [RaySensor.cc:206] ranges not constructed yet (zero sized)

still persists since more than half a year (see for example here and here). Also, when I try to spawn the robot into a world, using robot.launch, only the wheels are visible. OTOH, with turtlebot_empty_world.launch the whole robot appears.

On groovy, it doesn't even start with the output attached below.

My questions are:

• What is the recommended ROS distro to use for Turtlebot simulation with right now?
• Is anyone else using it with fuerte or groovy right now?
• Will simulation for the Kobuki robot be available for groovy (Thus serving as a replacement for the Turtlebot simulator)?

Groovy output:

kohlbrecher@opstation:~$ roslaunch turtlebot_gazebo  turtlebot_empty_world.launch 
... logging to /home/kohlbrecher/.ros/log/c267fb44-6489-11e2-967d-f0bf97da25e7/roslaunch-opstation-32659.log
Checking log directory for disk usage. This may take awhile.
Press Ctrl-C to interrupt
Done checking log file disk usage. Usage is <1GB.

started roslaunch server http://opstation:53565/

SUMMARY
========

PARAMETERS
 * /diagnostic_aggregator/analyzers/digital_io/path
 * /diagnostic_aggregator/analyzers/digital_io/startswith
 * /diagnostic_aggregator/analyzers/digital_io/timeout
 * /diagnostic_aggregator/analyzers/digital_io/type
 * /diagnostic_aggregator/analyzers/mode/path
 * /diagnostic_aggregator/analyzers/mode/startswith
 * /diagnostic_aggregator/analyzers/mode/timeout
 * /diagnostic_aggregator/analyzers/mode/type
 * /diagnostic_aggregator/analyzers/nodes/contains
 * /diagnostic_aggregator/analyzers/nodes/path
 * /diagnostic_aggregator/analyzers/nodes/timeout
 * /diagnostic_aggregator/analyzers/nodes/type
 * /diagnostic_aggregator/analyzers/power/path
 * /diagnostic_aggregator/analyzers/power/startswith
 * /diagnostic_aggregator/analyzers/power/timeout
 * /diagnostic_aggregator/analyzers/power/type
 * /diagnostic_aggregator/analyzers/sensors/path
 * /diagnostic_aggregator/analyzers/sensors/startswith
 * /diagnostic_aggregator/analyzers/sensors/timeout
 * /diagnostic_aggregator/analyzers/sensors/type
 * /diagnostic_aggregator/base_path
 * /diagnostic_aggregator/pub_rate
 * /kinect_laser/max_height
 * /kinect_laser/min_height
 * /kinect_laser/output_frame_id
 * /kinect_laser_narrow/max_height
 * /kinect_laser_narrow/min_height
 * /kinect_laser_narrow/output_frame_id
 * /pointcloud_throttle/max_rate
 * /robot_description
 * /robot_pose_ekf/freq
 * /robot_pose_ekf/imu_used
 * /robot_pose_ekf/odom_used
 * /robot_pose_ekf/publish_tf
 * /robot_pose_ekf/sensor_timeout
 * /robot_pose_ekf/vo_used
 * /robot_state_publisher/publish_frequency
 * /rosdistro
 * /rosversion
 * /use_sim_time

NODES
  /
    diagnostic_aggregator (diagnostic_aggregator/aggregator_node)
    gazebo (gazebo/debug)
    gazebo_gui (gazebo/gui)
    kinect_laser (nodelet/nodelet)
    kinect_laser_narrow (nodelet/nodelet)
    pointcloud_throttle (nodelet/nodelet)
    robot_pose_ekf (robot_pose_ekf/robot_pose_ekf)
    robot_state_publisher (robot_state_publisher/state_publisher)
    spawn_turtlebot_model (gazebo/spawn_model)

ROS_MASTER_URI=http://localhost:11311

core service [/rosout] found
process[gazebo-1]: started with pid [32687]
process[gazebo_gui-2]: started with pid [32697]
process[spawn_turtlebot_model-3]: started with pid [32701]
process[diagnostic_aggregator-4]: started with pid [32702]
process[robot_state_publisher-5]: started with pid [32723]
process[robot_pose_ekf-6]: started with pid [32734]
process[pointcloud_throttle-7]: started with pid [32735]
process[kinect_laser-8]: started with pid [32736]
process[kinect_laser_narrow-9]: started with pid [332]
GNU gdb (Ubuntu/Linaro 7.4-2012.04-0ubuntu2.1) 7.4-2012.04
Copyright (C) 2012 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
License GPLv3+: GNU GPL version 3 or later <http://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>
This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it.
There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law ...