Crimson 3.0 databox parameter referencing

I frequently create simple indicators on screen by copying the tag directly on screen and then altering the text states and background color states directly in the 'data box' with a black text color.

I'm currently making approx. a 100 of these from sequential tags. Each 'data box' has a data source of a specific tag (say MC100). I'd like to reference this same value in the 'fill format' control value without having to drag the same tag into the box again. Essentially I'd like the 'fill format' (when using a 2-state solid color) control to mirror whatever I put into the data source.

Is this possible in Crimson or do I need to do this manually?

Please let me know if you need clarification.

Thanks..

I believe the Fill Format must be applied manually; it will not automatically assume the color properties of the attached data tag.

However, you could ultimately accomplish this by using widgets. If you aren't familiar with widgets, read the section in the C3 manual. Basically, it groups a number of primitives together and you can specify that certain tag(s) be applied in multiple places. That's a bad explanation but I've attached an example. If you select the entire widget and look at its Properties you'll see that the MC100 tag is assigned to "Testtag" which is a widget data item. If you then look at the Properties for the data box within the widget (single click on the data box, then double click), you'll see that I used Testtag to control the text colors as well as the fill format. Once you get your widget set up, it's just a matter of duplicating it 100+ times and changing the top level tag assignment.

I found widgets to be confusing at first but now I use them all the time. They can be a great time saver if you have a lot of duplication in your program.

adisharr said:

I frequently create simple indicators on screen by copying the tag directly on screen and then altering the text states and background color states directly in the 'data box' with a black text color.

I'm currently making approx. a 100 of these from sequential tags. Each 'data box' has a data source of a specific tag (say MC100). I'd like to reference this same value in the 'fill format' control value without having to drag the same tag into the box again. Essentially I'd like the 'fill format' (when using a 2-state solid color) control to mirror whatever I put into the data source.

Is this possible in Crimson or do I need to do this manually?

Please let me know if you need clarification.

Thanks..

Click to expand...

If I am understanding you correctly, set up the first data box you want to be your standard, add all the other data boxes you want and then select all but the first. Right mouse click and choose Copy From - Copy Selective - then click on the first data box. From there, choose *only* the items you want duplicated.

Thanks for the replies, I haven't used any of the widget functionality before but it looks pretty powerful.

I have used the copy selective function to copy everything except the data source but I still need to manually go into each data box and change the fill format tag reference to match the data source tag reference for each.

It's not a huge deal, just a lot of clicking. It's a problem I could have finished already but why spend 30 minutes clicking when you can spend 3 hours looking for a 'faster' way