FTview SE tag arrays?

Hi,
Working on updating an existing HMI meaning I have to start from zero since its the original uses a different vendor. I cant touch the PLC program which makes some tasks difficult. The thing is that the PLC (PLC-5) program has about 100 status messages/alarms that are displayed on the HMI. The way it does this is by setting a single tag to a number. example 7 might be E-Stop, 45 might be door not closed. The HMI reads this tag and displays the correct message. That is to say the string/text for each message is in the HMI not the PLC. So how can I use this one tag to recreate the same thing on the HMI? Messages are standard feature on the original hmi program as in you can create lists there but, its not so obvious in FTview SE.

My ideas are
1) Create all 100+ messages as an object and then use the visibility animation on the text to show or hide them.

2) Create a local HMI tag array and set a string display object to display it.

3) Use alarms and events

4) Some other way i can't think of.

The thing is I don't know how to create an array on the HMI so that I can do something like message[msgNumber]. and I think I'm going to have a similar issue using alarms and events. Again, can't do it on the PLC. Whats the best option?

Could you use a multistate indicator? Just map the value on the connection tab to the PLC tag, with the caption for each state being the alarm message? I may not completely understand what you are trying to do.

Thysia said:

Could you use a multistate indicator? Just map the value on the connection tab to the PLC tag, with the caption for each state being the alarm message? I may not completely understand what you are trying to do.

Click to expand...

+1

'Display different messages based on the value of the connected tag' is a multistate indicator's raison d'être.

I expect you could also set the messages up as alarms triggered by value; I can't say with certainty since I have only ever used ME not SE.