Protool possibilities??

Borte · Aug 15, 2005

Hello everybody!

I have a question about possibilities in protool (6.0).

I want to move and change the dimensions of a line dynamically, I know I can change the position in x and y directions but I also want to change the size and width of the line. The fields are available on the same screen as the position data but I can only use a constant for it. Does anyone know if it's possible to change this dynamically? I thought about using VB script for it but I couldn’t figure out how to write a script that protool accepted.

btw: Please go gently on any typos, I'm just back from a 6 week vacation... (my brain is still on vacation mode)

Cheers
Borte

Amr Hassan · Aug 15, 2005

hi Borte

i do not think this is possible with protool

i would think of puting few lines together and make some of the disappear according to a tag , i thing this would be a bad solution if this have to be repeated a lot

jwall · Aug 15, 2005

Best chance would be to have a line in the background, and a sqaure over top as a mask. Move it around accordingly to make the line appear as changing shape.

You don't have access to line objects, or any dimensions in general, during runtime on the HMI.

It is possible to make the game "pong" though...hehehe

Borte · Aug 15, 2005

Hmmm.... To bad.

I was trying to have a box (with dynamic size) to move around inside (over) a trend display to display certain setpoints.

Thanks for the replies

Cheers
Borte

RMA · Aug 15, 2005

Could you not do something like this. Create two Objects big enough to completely mask the object whose size you wish to vary. Fill them with the screen background colour and either colour the borders the same or set "no border". Position your objects so that all objects have the same origin and then use the Position attribute to move one of your objects allong the X-axis and the other up the Y-axis. If you place these two objects over the object whose size you want to vary, this will give you exactly the same effect.

Something like this:

You may need to play around with the planes if you've got a lot of other objects in the picture, but it should work.

Borte · Aug 15, 2005

RMA: That could work but the problem is that the object I'm tryin to display is over a trend graphic (Static though) so my "box" object has to be transparent... Not quite as easy as I wanted.

I'll guess I'll just make it easier. This is not an important feature its more one of those "nice to have" and "would make it more user friendly" things...

I'll see what I can do within the boundaries in protool.

Cheers
Borte

RMA · Aug 15, 2005

I've not used Trends in ProTool as yet. Assuming that you can have other objects in the Trend screen, the Trend object itself is the box whose size you want to vary, so you just need to cover it up with the background coloured rectangles and move them in the X- and Y-axes.

Or am I missing something?

Borte · Aug 15, 2005

It's not the trend it self, its a object placed on top of the trend curve...

I'll see if I can upload a pic to explain it

EDIT* Pic uploaded

jwall · Aug 15, 2005

That would be tuff to impossible. I wish I had time to make my own driver for the Profibus, and make our own HMI runtime. It wouldn't be hard, and it could all be done with C# or c++ and primative vb

RMA · Aug 16, 2005

Hmmm, like jwall, can't see any way to do that directly and a dig through the Help files for WinCC Flexible suggests that there's no great breakthrough there either. What exactly are you trying to achieve? It looks like you might be trying to zoom into or to select a particular part of the Trend curve? Maybe you could achieve a similar result with a different approach.

Borte · Aug 16, 2005

I'm trying to visualize the setpoint for a "window" directly on the curve. Just to make it easier for the operator to understand whats going on "under the hood".

Cheers
Borte

RMA · Aug 16, 2005

Do you mean something like this?

Borte · Aug 16, 2005

Not really.

Ok Here goes:

I have a curve of with distance (X) and force (Y).
I have to sets of setpoint for validating the curve given by Min/Max force and start and end position. These windows can be defined by a rectangle on the curve (since the curve is distance * force).

Thereby to display the changes the operator are doing to the setpoints for the window i want to move the box (visualizing the window) up/down and sideways over the curve to show where the setpoint are on the current curve.

So changing the startpoint of the curve would extend/contract the box (window) in the X direction of the curve, changing the min/max value would extend/contract it in the Y direction.

I know this is not the best explaination but I don't know how to properly explain it. If you look at the picture you'll probably get a idea.

Cheers
Borte

RMA · Aug 16, 2005

OK, I think I understand what you mean. Certainly an expandable box would be the easiest way to do it, but since that doesn't seem to be possible we need to look for alternatives.

Am I right in assuming that you want to be able to see the whole of the curve all the time. In other words if you were able to realise your expanding box, the box itself would be transparent and effectively you would just be using the outside border as the indicator. Or would it be acceptable if only the part of the curve that lies inside the box is visible?

Borte · Aug 16, 2005

RMA: You passed the 1000 post mark!! Greetings to you!

Am I right in assuming that you want to be able to see the whole of the curve all the time. In other words if you were able to realise your expanding box, the box itself would be transparent and effectively you would just be using the outside border as the indicator.

This is what I'm trying to achive.
But I'm starting to realize that protool isn't quite as advanced as I want it to be.

Cheers
Borte

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