Brief Introduce of Visual DCT

1
Brief Introduce of Visual DCT

• Guobao Shen
• KEKB Control Group
• March 2, 2004

2
Contents

• EPICS and EPICS Database
• Text Editors and Graphical IDE
• CapFast
• VDCT features
• Example
• Conclusion
• Exercise

3
EPICS

• Most popular CS in particle accelerator community
• Features
• Record relations
• Distributed database and scalability

4
EPICS Database

• simple ASCII file, generated by numerous
  applications
• Text editor
• Script
• Relational Database Tool
• EPICS-aware Database Configuration Tools
• CAPFAST (a schematic entry application)
• GDCT
• JDCT
• VDCT

5
Text Editors or Graphical IDE?

• Large text files
• Lots of syntax errors
• No debugging tools
• Considerably longer
• development time

• Improve on database transparency
• Better design
• Easier maintenance
• No syntax errors
• Advanced features of an IDE
• Shorter development time

6
CapFast

• CapFast was the leading graphical database
  configuration tool
• Designed for electrical circuits drawings
• Not optimized for EPICS
• Only graphical tool (not IDE)
• Translate to EPICS db
• Professional CAD tool
• Paying several thousand dollars for tools you
  dont need

7
Visual DCT

• Visual EPICS database configuration tool
• completely written in Java
• Platform independence
• First funded by SLS, developed by Cosylab
• Recent funded by APS/DIAMOND/SNS
• code development by Cosylab
• available under an open source license
• Modified BSD License

8
VDCT features

• VDCT talks 100 EPICS
• Graphical data saved as comments
• provide features missing in existing
  configuration tools
• Such as Capfast and GDCT
• DB as transparent as with CapFast
• Plugins
• Simulation
• EPICS
• ORACLE

9
VDCT features

• create, move and link records
• easily modify fields and links
• Group records together in logical block
• have a powerful DB parser
• allows importing existing DB and DBD files
• Output standard DB file
• allows DBs to be edited in other tools or
  manually
• Preserve all comments and record order
• save visual data as comment

10
Engine

• Require a DBD file
• Can work with multiple DBD files
• Can open any EPICS DB (powerful DB parser)
• Reverse engineering
• Preserves record link order
• Preserves DB comments
• DBs can still be edited manually
• On the spot corrections possible

11
Graphical Features

• Clipboard, undo, object inspector, visual linking
• Colorful links and illustrative comments
• Postscript printing

12
Status of VDCT

• make a CapFast replacement
• A lot of people are already testing it
• Latest Build
• 2.4.1248

13
Example

• Run VDCT
• java -cp VisualDCT.jar com.cosylab.vdct.VisualDCT
  ltDBDgt or ltDBgt
• java -jar VisualDCT.jar ltDBDgt or ltDBgt

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Example

• Open a db file which includes dbd file
• ! DBDSTART
• ! DBD("../dbd/app.dbd")
• ! DBDEND
• open a dbd file
• and generate a
• new database

15
Example

• Main Window of Visual DCT

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Example

• Zoom
• In Shift Right
• Out Shift Left
• Selection Shift Space
• Move
• Up Ctrl Up
• Down Ctrl Down
• Left Ctrl Left
• Right Ctrl Right

17
Example

• Create new record
• Click right mouse button on workspace and select
  new records
• Or double click left button

18
Example

• Choose record type
• Specify record name
• Such as (user)ai
• If name already exists
• it will report it

19
Example

• Select records
• Left click on one record to select it
• Ctrl left click on multi records to select them
  
• Left button drag

20
Example

• Move one record
• Place mouse cursor on record
• Press left button and drag objects to new
  location
• Release mouse button
• Move multi records
• Select records
• Press left button and drag objects to new
  location
• Release mouse button

21
Example

• Inspector window
• Double click on record to active
• inspect (examine) and modify of all objects
  properties, edit record instance
• Object combo box - shows currently inspected
  object and allows user to choose object in
  current database
• Property table - name-value pair table allowing
  user to inspect or modify fields.
• Comment text area - shows record comment and
  allows user to modify it.
• Status bar - provides basic help, use to
  understand the meaning of the fields

22
Example

• Inspector window
• visibility property
• - show if not default
• - always show
• - never show
• Input and modify value of field

23
Example
24
Display by using MEDM
25
Conclusion

• VisualDCT is THE productivity tool for EPICS
• It improves EPICS on its strong points
• It has become the topic of the discussion in
  EPICS community
• Strong collaboration through APS
• Online Document and Update
• http//visualdct.cosylab.com/

26
Exercise

• Generate an application example
• makeBaseApp.pl -t example app
• makeBaseApp.pl -i -t example app
• make
• Type vdct to active VDCT
• Load dbd/app.dbd
• Create and define your own records
• Save as xxx.db
• Modify iocBoot/iocapp/st.cmd manually, for
  example
• dbLoadRecords("db/xxx.db","userxxxxx")