Using Power Templates

Introduction

Hello and welcome to a new guide on how to best use Movicon.NExT™.

In this technote, we will introduce you to the power templates and use an example to show you how they are used.

The Power Templates

The power templates are symbols to which a structure’s variables have been assigned and then applied with the command to create Power Templates. The practicality of using a powerful template lies in its ability to support multiple instantiations based on the number of declared structures that have been associated.

This guide will use an example to give you a clearer picture on how to use them.

Example

 Structure definition

After having started up the Movicon.NExT editor and created, or loaded, a project, start by defining a structure.  To do this:

• Open the I/O Data Server located on the project tree within the Project Explorer window.
• Access the Data Structure tab by selecting the corresponding I/O Data Server tab.
• Right-click within the workspace and select the Add New Structure option from the contextual menu.  Enter Motor in its Name field.
• Once the structure has been added, select and right-click it to open the contextual menu.  Select the Add New Member option.  Enter State in its Name field and select Boolean as its Data Type.
• Repeat this procedure to configure a second member but instead enter Speed in its Name field and select Int16 as its Data Type.

Creating Tags

Creata la struttura, è possibile creare due tag di tipo Motor:

• Open the I/O Data Server located on the project tree within the Project Explorer window.
• Access the Tags List by selecting the corresponding I/O Data Server tab.
• Right-click within the workspace and select the Add New Tag option from the menu that appears.
• Configure the tags by using their properties window in the following way:
• 
  

  Name	Mot1
  Model Type	Struttura
  Data Structure	Motor

  
  

  Name	Mot2
  Model Type	Struttura
  Data Structure	Motor

  
  
• Confirm the changes by clicking the Accept Changes key on the toolbar at the top of the tag’s properties windows.

Once you have finished configuring the tags, save the project by clicking on the Save All button in the Movicon.NExT editor toolbar.

Creating Screen

At this point, create a screen:

• Look for the Screens resource in the project's tree structure in the Project Explorer window and select it.
• Right-click it and select the New option from the menu which opens
• A New Screen popup will appear through which you can set the screen's main properties. Configure the screen as follows:
• • Width: 1920
  • Height: 1080
  • Name: Main
• Click the OK button to confirm the configuration.

Once the screen has been created, you can then change the project's properties by inserting the screen as the project's Main screen which will show when the project starts up. To do this:

• Select the name of the project from the application's tree structure.
• Open the Properties window.
• Change the following project properties in this way:
• • Startup Page Type: Main Screen
  • Startup Screen Name: Main

Once you have finished configuring the project startup page, click on the Save All icon located on the Movicon.NExT  editor’s toolbar at the top to save the project.

Make sure that the Main screen is open, click on the Symbol Library tab on the editor’s far right, next to the properties window, to open the Symbol library offered by Movicon.NExT.

Place a motor with animation on the screen:

• Open the Symbols Library tab and open the Motors > Digital Animated folder and select to drag a motor onto the screen.
• Assign the Mot1\Status tag to the motor you have just placed on screen.

Next, open the ToolBox Library and drag a gauge, either from the Gauges or Advanced Gauges folder, onto the screen.  Once placed on screen, assign it the Mot1\Speed tag.

This time, select and drag the Standard Metro Style button from the Buttons > Standard folder and assign it the Mot1\State Tag and ON as its text.
Now associate two commands to change the state of the Motor from 0 to 1 and speed from 0 to a fixed value such as 80.
To do this:

• Select the button placed on the screen and open the Commands tab at the bottom of the Movicon.NExT editor.
• Select the Tag Value command from those available in the Commands pane and configure it as so:
• 
  

  Tag	Mot1\State
  Value to set	1
  Command Type	Set

  
  
• Now that the motor1 state value has been configured, repeat the same procedure for the motor’s speed by selecting the Tag Value command and configuring it in the following way:
• 
  

  Tag	Mot1\Speed
  Value to set	80
  Command Type	Set

Duplicate the ON button for motor 1 and change the text from ON to OFF and the values in the commands from 1 to 0 and from 80 to 0 respectively.

Creating Power Template

Select and right-click all the objects. Then select the Symbol item from the contextual menu that opens and select Create group, and then select Group.  You can also use the Ctrl+G combo keys to get the same result.

Once the objects have been grouped, open the I/O Data Server’s Settings tab and startup the Server by clicking on the Start Server icon on the toolbar.  

When the server starts up, select the object on screen and click the Create Template button on the Movicon.NExT editor’s toolbar. Upon terminating this operation, the Power Template will display showing the association between the symbol and data structure tags.  Click OK to confirm.

Double-check to see that the object is still selected, then right-click it to open the contextual menu.  Select the Symbol option and then Add to Symbol Library option. In this way, the custom symbol you have just created will be saved in the library and made always available for further use.

Now, you can place the created symbol on screen and drag the Mot2 structure tag onto the symbol to assign it.

Save the project by clicking on the Save All button on the top toolbar of the Movicon.NExT editor.

Test Runtime

Launch the project into runtime by clicking the Start Runtime button on the toolbar of the Movicon.NExT editor to test everything you have created by changing the values using the Movicon.NExT Server.