Hi,
I am trying to copy a PAC Display file for use with the same strategy on another controller. The strategy will be largely unchanged except for some IP addresses.
How can I avoid changing all the tag names to match the new control engine I will create? Is there a way to do a find/replace on the control engine name?
Thanks,
Corey
Hi Corey,
Welcome to the forums.
Im just a little fuzzy about what you have and what you are trying to do.
Please forgive me while I stumble around a bit here and ask a few questions…
You have an existing PAC Display project with one controller, and you are trying to copy the windows you already have and attach them to a new controller?
If so, copy the window, name it something new.
Now you have two windows that look the same and are attached to the same controller.
Click Configure -> Control Engines.
If the new controller is not added to the PAC Project yet, here is where you can do it from.
You will have to call it a different name, and of course it will have a different IP address.
It can have the same strategy name.
Once you have configured the new controller, you will have two controllers for this PAC Project.
Go to the new window and right click on some space (not on an object or text).
Click on ‘Select All’ from the pop up menu.
Now, right click on an object, from that pop up menu, click on ‘Replace’.
From that menu, you can select the old control engine, and then the new control engine.
Click Ok and BOOM!
All the graphic points on that window will be attached to the new controller.
If thats NOT what you are wanting to do…
If you are trying to make a whole new PAC Display project, but with a different controller…
Much the same.
Copy your current project into a new directory.
Open it up.
Configure the new control engine.
Window by window, right click, select all, replace and swap controllers.
Once all the windows are done, you can (if you want) delete your old controller.
If that’s not what you are trying to do… then lets know and we will see if we can help…
Cheers,
Ben.
Thanks, that first explanation is exactly what I was trying to do, just never done it before.
I didn’t need to select each window, I just selected scope of “entire project” and it changed everything.
Thanks so much for saving me a ton of time.
Corey H.
Hey Corey,
Great question, and one that I am always keen to talk about whenever it comes up!
I love PAC Terminal. There, I said it…
PAC Terminal is the key to PAC Project.
It is the glue that joins the controllers to PAC Display and to PAC Control.
Configure a controller in PAC Terminal, and it shows up in both apps.
Configure a controller in one of the apps, and it shows up in PAC Terminal and the other app.
Here is a nice OptoKB article about how to transfer controllers from one computer to another.
Once a controller is set up in PAC Terminal, you are Ok to go.
So, to answer your question, the controller exists in the Windows Registry.
Yes, you need to create the control engine on each PC you use PAC Project on.
Yes, you can call the control engine the same on all the PC’s. (That’s why I showed how to export and import the controllers).
The other cool thing is that its the controller name that matters, not its IP address.
So you can edit the IP address of the control engine in PAC Terminal and PAC Control and PAC Display do no care.
Think about this for a sec. It means that you can run the actual strategy locally on your laptop with PAC Sim or SoftPAC and an IP address of 127.0.0.1 and then when you are ready, you can change the IP address and run it on the real controller.
Very cool.
Cheers,
Ben.
Thanks for the info!