Topic: DMD0210

Using the Data View

The Data View is used to monitor the status of, and optionally change the values of selected memory locations in the Do-more controller. Multiple data views can be open at the same time, each viewing the same or different memory locations, in the same or a different format (Native, Binary, Octal, BCD/ Hex, etc.).

Docking / Floating - the Data View dialog is a dockable  and floatable window. Note: double-clicking the title bar of the Data View will toggle between the Docked and Floating states.

To create a new Data View select the Debug-> Data View-> New menu option, or press the Ctrl+Shft+F3 keys.

To open an existing Data View select the Debug-> Data View-> Open menu option. The File Open dialog will appear, allowing the user to navigate to the saved data view file.

To save the current Data View, select the Debug-> Data View-> Save menu option. If the Data View has previously been saved, then the current contents of the Data View will be written to the previously specified file. If the Data View has not been previously saved the SaveAs dialog will appear, allowing the user to specify a file name.

To Export All of the contents of a Data View in CSV format:

1. right-click with the mouse on the Data View and select Export-> All from the pop-up menu. The Save As dialog will appear, allowing the programmer to specify a file name.

To Export only Some of the contents of a Data View in CSV format:

1. click and drag with the mouse (or use the shift + arrow keys) to select the entries in the Data View to export
    

2. right-click with the mouse on the Data View and select Export-> Selection from the pop-up menu. The Save As dialog will appear, allowing the programmer to specify a file name.

To Open a new Trend View with All of the contents of a Data View:
 

1. right-click with the mouse on the Data View and select Trend All from the pop-up menu to send all of the elements in the Data View to the new Trend View
    

To Open a new Trend View with only Some of the contents of a Data View:
 

1. left-click and drag with the mouse (or use the shift + arrow keys) to select the entries in the Data View to send to the Trend View.
    

2. right-click with the mouse on the Data View and select Trend Element / Selection from the pop-up menu to send only the previously selected elements in the Data View to the Trend View.

The Data View Dialog

The following is a quick discussion of the toolbar buttons found at the top of the Data View dialog, from left to right:

• Edit Mode - click this button (right-click -> Toggle Edit Mode) to enable the write operation for elements that are read/write.
   

• Display Format - this selection drop-down will contain a list of display formats that are appropriate for the selected element. The default display format for non-structure elements is "Native", which means the element's value will be displayed in the proper format for it's native data type. This will normally be the correct selection for numeric values, and should only be changed to specifically display the value in a particular format. For example, displaying unsigned values as Hexadecimal or Binary is sometimes appropriate when the bits of that value represent flags or status bits.
  
  The optional display formats available for bit and numeric fields are: Binary, Octal , BCD/Hex, Timer, Seconds Time, Date Field, Time Field, 1970 Epoch, IP Address.
  
  Structures are a special case because they have multiple fields with differing data types. Displaying structures in the Data View will take multiple rows, so there are four different displays formats specifically  for structure that take this into account: They are: "short multi-line", "long multi-line", "short single line", and "long single line". These display formats have varying amounts of data and are oriented for tall/thin displays or short/wide displays. The default display format for structures is "short multi-line".
  
  Strings too are a special case in that there are some purpose-built display formats that aid in debugging string manipulation operations. Refer to the following example where the String element SS0 contains "Step 7: Open Drain Valve". This table lists the 7 display formats and shows how the contents of SS0 will be displayed in each.

The three buttons to the right of the format field are used to manage the contents of the Edits columns as follows:
 

• Clear Edits - click this button to remove all of the values from the Edits column.
   

• Write Current Edit - click this button to write the value in the Edits column for the currently selected element only.
   

• Write All Edits - click this button to write all of the values in the Edits column to the controller. The process of writing multiple edits will take multiple controller scans because each write operation will be done on a separate scan, which means that the values will NOT end up in the controller at the same time.

The remaining portion of the Data View is a grid that has three columns, as follows:

Element - contains the controller elements to monitor

Status - displays the current value of the element, using the selected display format

Edits - is only visible if Edit Mode is enabled - is where the user enters new values for the controller element

Customizing the Data View Display

The look and functionality of the Data Views can be customized by the selections on the Data View tab of the View-> Options  menu.

The 'Apply Options to' selections at the top specify which Data Views the changes to the options will be applied to.

Current View - the changes apply only to the currently selected Data View.

All Open Views - the changes apply to all of the currently open Data Views.

New Views - the changes do not apply to the currently selected Data Views, only to Data Views that are opened from this point forward

The General Settings group controls the look of the grid.
 

• Status On - when selected, status updates will occur
   

• Show Toolbar - when selected, the toolbar will be displayed at the top of the dialog
   

• Show Status Line - when selected, the status bar at the bottom of the dialog will be displayed
   

• Show Column Headers - when selected, the "Elements", "Status", and "Edits" column headers will be displayed
   

• Show Grid Lines - when selected, the horizontal and vertical grid lines will be displayed
   

• Show Row Headers - when selected, the row numbers will be displayed
   

• Show Column Headers in CSV - when selected, the "Elements", "Status", and "Edits" column headers will be exported along with the Data View contents when a Data View-> Export operation is performed.

The Documentation group enables/disables the element documentation display in the element column.
 

• Elements  - display the element name
   

• Nicknames - for elements that have nicknames only the nickname is displayed, if the element does not have a nickname the element name is displayed.
   

• Extra Info - displays the element's Extra Info (if present)
   

• Descriptions - displays the element's Description (if present)

The Title (current view only) allows the user to specify a 16 character name for the currently selected view. By default, Data Views are named "Data" plus a sequentially assigned number.

The Mode group specifies whether the Data View can write new values for controller elements
 

• Read Only (no writes) - disables the Data View's ability to write to the controller
   

• Read/Write - (the default) - enables the Data View's ability to write to the controller

The Safety selection specifies whether a write operation will display a confirmation before the operation is performed.
 

• Click on the "Confirm Writes" check box to enable the confirmation dialog before any write operations are performed

The Bit Display Settings group allows the user to select what is displayed in the Status column for bit elements.
 

• Click on the "On" button to display a dialog that contains additional icons that can be displayed for the ON status of a bit element.
   

• Click on the "Off" button to display a dialog that contains additional icons that can be displayed for the OFF status of a bit element.

Click the OK button to save the changes to the Options.

Click the Cancel button to discard any changes made to the Options.

Entering Controller Elements in a Data View

Entering controller elements in a Data View is quite easy, simply place the cursor in a cell in the Element column and type in the name of the controller element (or it's nickname if it has one) then press the enter key. Controller elements can also be entered by selecting them from the Element Browser (F9), or using the down-arrow (auto-complete).

Editing an item in a Data View is done by placing the cursor on the item to be edited and press <F2>, or double-clicking on the item to be edited.

Deleting an item from a Data View is done by placing the cursor on the item to be deleted and pressing the delete key. To delete a range of items, select the range and press the delete key. To select a range of items, place the cursor on the first item to be selected. Hold down the <shift> key and press the up or down arrows, or click with the mouse and drag the cursor to select the desired range of items.

Note: pressing the delete key a second time will move the contents of the rows below the deleted element to move up

Using the cut / copy / paste operations to add / remove items from / to data views is done by selecting the itmes to be cut, copied, or pasted, then selecting the appropriate option from the edit menu. The cut option will remove the selected items from the current view and place them into the cut buffer. The copy option will leave the selected items in the current view AND place them into the cut buffer. The paste option will copy the items from the cut buffer into the current view.

Adding successive items to a Data View

The auto-increment option is a quick way to add a range of items to a Data View. To use this feature, Insert the first element of the range into the Data View. Then place the cursor on the first element of the range and press Ctrl+Enter (or right-click on the item with the mouse and choose increment). The next controller element in that range will be added to the Data View.

Structures in the controller are handled as a special case of the increment option because Structures have multiple fields. The auto-increment operation changes based on what has been selected:

If the structure element itself is being incremented:
 

• Ctrl+Enter - (Increment) - adds the next structure to the Data View. For example, if Timer structure T0 is selected, Ctrl+Enter will add the Timer structure for T1 to the Data View.
   

• Ctrl+Shft+Enter - (Expand Structure) - adds all of the elements of the structure to the Data View. For example, if Timer structure T0 is selected, Ctrl+Shift+Enter will add all of the structure fields from Timer Structure T0 to the Data View
   

If a single field of a structure is being incremented:
 

• Ctrl+Enter - (Increment) - adds the same field of the next structure to the Data View, For example. if the field T0.Acc is selected, Ctrl+Enter will add T1.Acc to the Data View.
   

• Ctrl+Shift+Enter - (Next Field) - adds the next field (this could be the next field in the same structure or the first field of the next structure) to the Data View. For example, if the field T0.Acc is selected, Ctrl+Shift+Enter will add T0.Done to the Data View. The next Ctrl+Shift+Enter will add T0.Zero to the Data View.

Using Casts to Control How Values are Displayed in a Data View

Casting is a ”C"-programming language term that means "to change the type of" a variable. Do-more Designer uses the colon ":" character to perform casting operations. The most common situations where casting is used are mapping operations like bit-picks or packing bits into Bytes, Words, or DWords.

Note: except for 'Bit-of-Word' and 'Mapping Bit Ranges to Bytes, Words, or DWords' operations, casting elements from one type to another is normally not needed.

For more information on using Cast operations in Do-more Designer refer to the help topic on Casting.

Changing the Update Interval

There are times when the ability to change the default update rate of the various Views in the Do-more Designer software is needed. By default, Do-more Designer will generate communication requests at a rather high rate in an effort to present the most current status values for the on-screen elements. But on computers that are CPU-speed-challenged or memory-challenged, maintaining this update rate at the expense of allowing CPU time for other processing can be a problem. To address this need, Do-more Designer uses two entries in the [SETUP] group of DmDesigner.Ini, named ProgViewInterval & DataViewInterval, to govern the rate at which the Views will update the values of the elements they contain.

ProgrViewInterval applies to Ladder Views, Debug Views, the Module Browser, Data Views, Device Views, PID Overview, etc.. Its value is the frequency (in milliseconds) that status communication requests occur for those views. The default for these views is 25ms. If the entry does not exist, or is commented out (like in the example below), the frequency will be the 25ms default. This value can have it be as small (for a fast update), or as large (for a slow update) as desired. Note: 0 means ”as fast as possible” not ”instantaneous”.

The Data View has a separate entry, called DataViewInterval, in the same group,  Its value is the frequency (in milliseconds) that status communication requests occur only for Data Views. The default value is 75ms.

If both ProgViewInterval & DataViewInterval exist in DmDesigner.Ini, ProgViewInterval will supersede DataViewInterval ONLY if it is SLOWER (i.e. a higher number). If only the ProgViewInternal exists, any Data View will use the slower of that value or the value or 75 (the default for Data Views).

The default condition for both of these entries is that they are both commented out (as shown below), meaning that all of the views in Do-more Designer will operate at an update frequency of 25ms, and on most modern computers with sufficient RAM the default intervals should not cause any issues.

[SETUP]

;ProgViewInterval=25

;DataViewInterval=75

To engage one of these settings, remove the semicolon from the entry and change the update interval to the millisecond value desired. Note: because Do-more Designer only reads the entries from DmDesigner.Ini when the software is first started, Do-more Designer will need to be closed, then re-opened to put the changes into effect.

See Also:

Using the Trend View to Monitor the Do-more Controller
 

Using the Data View to Monitor Do-more Controller Memory

Forcing I/O and Memory Items

Using the Change Value Dialog