AB PanelView FTView Version Question

[MikeVT]

I have a project with a PanelView Plus 7, to program. I have recently upgraded my FT View Studio to version 12. The end user has version 11, and will need to modify / add to my programming.


If I use FT View Studio V12, to develop this HMI, and provide the end user with .apa & .mer files, will the end user be able to open and modify the HMI programming?


Some of the 'pop up' message language leads me to believe the answer is no. Due to the message stating, when opening a version 11 application:


"If you continue to open this application with version '12.00.00' of FactoryTalk View Studio, the application will be converted to this new version. Once the application has been converted, you will not be able to open the application using an older version of FactoryTalk View Studio."


Has anybody run into this? Advice and suggestion please? I am working on loading FT View Studio 11 onto a VM, as a possible solution.

 

[joseph_e2]

The best solution I know of is to keep v11 on a VM. That's what I do. I have VMs for versions 5.00, 5.11 (an experiment for something I don't remember), 9, 11, and 12. Each upgrade was to support a new machine but I kept the old version just in case.


To your original question, as far as I'm aware, if you upgrade to v12, they'll have to as well to use the apa file. If you build an older MER file they *may* be able to restore it, but that process isn't always perfect. And I'm not actually 100% sure it will work anyway.

 

[plvlce]

With a couple significant caveats, the end user will be able to open the file as long as you create the .mer at the version he has (or lower). I've done it plenty of times and virtually never had issues (aside from the caveats I will describe in more detail below).

Under no circumstances I'm aware of can the .apa be opened with any version lower than that which it was created with.


As mentioned above, there are a couple of caveats to this. One of them isn't relevant here and I mention only for completeness's sake -- .mer below v5 simply cannot be converted back at all.

The other issue started showing up with v12 of Studio and is based on the version of ActiveX components used -- see this technote for details. Basically, if the end user has an older version of an ActiveX component you use (or simply does not have it at all), he won't be able to convert back without patching his install.

As a final note regarding the message you quote, it does not actually know what version of Studio was used to create it -- that message is triggered purely by the .mer version. If, using your v12 install, you elected to create a v11 .mer and then immediately turned around and converted your fresh .mer back, you would get the same message as if it had been created with a v11 install.

EDIT: Upon examining the patches, it appears Rockwell only offers patches for v12 and v13. If you have this issue, your user will have to upgrade as there is no patch for v11.