AdamR&L Posted December 8, 2017 Share Posted December 8, 2017 In Spotlight, I am trying to extract and link information between jumper cables and lighting devices using the assign multicable circuits. I know it must be possible, as the jumper cables already extract the position information into the location field. But, I want it to go further and extract the Unit # information as well. Any ideas?? Quote Link to comment
Sam Jones Posted December 8, 2017 Share Posted December 8, 2017 How is it that you wish to do this? The "Assign Multicable Circuits..." is the command that extracts the information. The information it extracts is put into the Circuit fields of the selected Multicable. If you want to change what is collected and put into the Circuit fields, you need to use the "Circuit Assign Preference..." command. That command will let you select a different Lighting Device parameter to place in the Circuit fields of the selected Multicable. If you want to do something different, what would that be? Quote Link to comment
AdamR&L Posted December 8, 2017 Author Share Posted December 8, 2017 Yes, I do understand that the "Assign Multicable Circuits" extracts information into the selected Multicable. This works excellent, as the information that I want goes into the Multicable Circuit fields. No issues there. In addition to that information going into the Multicable, there is information that is automatically extracted into the individual Jumpers when they are automatically placed using the Assign Multicable Circuit command. That information is "Position" information from the Lighting Device. This "Position" information is automatically put into the "Location" field of the Jumper cables. I would like to additionally have the "Unit #" information automatically be extracted into the Jumper cables as well. The Jumper cables know what light they are going to, I just want more information to be extracted so I do not have to manually input each Unit number into each cable. This is very time consuming, but is a must for creating paperwork to build breakouts in the shop. Quote Link to comment
Sam Jones Posted December 9, 2017 Share Posted December 9, 2017 An understandable need, but currently, there is no way to do that. I have heard from a bunch of people about different info they would like to pass between fixtures and cables, and additionally, functionality that will do appropriate deletions. Hopefully this will be added in future versions. Thinking about it. I can probably create a modified "Assign Multicable Circuits" command that does what you wish. Do you just want the Unit Number or would you want the position name and unit number. For example: FOH - #9. Can't give you an ETA for this, but working on it will be a nice occasional break from a currently onerous project. Quote Link to comment
AdamR&L Posted December 10, 2017 Author Share Posted December 10, 2017 Thank you Sam. The position and unit number in two separate fields would be excellent. Although, the "Position" from the Lighting Device already automatically goes into the "Location" field in the Jumper, so the Jumper would just need an add-on "Unit" field that extracts the info. I did however figure out a temporary work around. I have started labeling my Unit numbers with "Position - Unit#" like your example. I then do a Find and Modify and copy the "Unit#" field to the "Position" field. I renamed the Jumpers "Location" field to "Position - Unit#" within the Plug-In manager. Now, the information that I want in the Jumper cable, extracts as a "Position and Unit#" number, just like your example. Cable Tools is a powerful plug-in and I appreciate your help. Let me know if you get around to making the modified "Assign Multicable Circuits" command. Quote Link to comment
Sam Jones Posted December 10, 2017 Share Posted December 10, 2017 How about putting the Unit Number in a User Field? Quote Link to comment
AdamR&L Posted December 10, 2017 Author Share Posted December 10, 2017 That would work, as long as it isn't User Field 6, which is the Lightning Tapes field. Quote Link to comment
Sam Jones Posted December 10, 2017 Share Posted December 10, 2017 Actually the Jumper cable object has only 3 User fields, one of which must be a number. Because it must be numeric, User Field 3(Number) would be a bad choice, since it could not hold numbers like 3A. How about User Field 1. Quote Link to comment
Ryan Seybert Posted May 1, 2018 Share Posted May 1, 2018 I wouldn't mind seeing the fixture take on the attribute of what cable its receiving. For instance, if you run 10ft L6-20 and 25ft 5PIN jumpers to a fixture it would populate user fields for use downstream in paperwork and lighting tapes. Unless there is a way of doing this already... I'm coming from about 12 years of AutoCAD. All my symbols have cable fields for use in paperwork and truss tape. Rather surprised VW doesn't have these fields implemented already. 1 Quote Link to comment
Mike Myers Posted May 1, 2018 Share Posted May 1, 2018 (edited) 3 hours ago, rseybert said: I wouldn't mind seeing the fixture take on the attribute of what cable its receiving. For instance, if you run 10ft L6-20 and 25ft 5PIN jumpers to a fixture it would populate user fields for use downstream in paperwork and lighting tapes. Unless there is a way of doing this already... I'm coming from about 12 years of AutoCAD. All my symbols have cable fields for use in paperwork and truss tape. Rather surprised VW doesn't have these fields implemented already. I agree completely. Once the cable is associated with the fixture it will make life so much easier. Without it being associated to the fixture there's not much point on me doing all the clicking around that this tool requires. I posted this to the wishlist two years ago but unfortunately it hasn't materialized yet... Edited May 1, 2018 by Mike Myers Quote Link to comment
Popular Post Sam Jones Posted May 2, 2018 Popular Post Share Posted May 2, 2018 First, please understand that I am not an employee of Vectorworks, and I am not formally associated with them. They have purchased some of my tools and improved upon them. That being said.... OK, yes, keeping track of everything and its relationship to everything else would be nice. I am currently working on an upgraded version of the cable tools for AutoPlot Tools for Spotlight, and I am hoping to include some added functionality that will allow people to assign more fixture data and cable data to various places, along with enhanced inventory management, but there are issues, not impossible to solve, but issues none the less. Understand that not everyone wants the same stuff in the same places. It cannot even be assumed that everyone who is using Spotlight is needing to assign cable info to Lighting Devices. Some use the cable tool in other disciplines. Rigging and audio come to mind, but even some lighting users want to assign cable to symbols with attached records. I'm sure that we will be dealing with many different additional objects to which cables attach, like optos, nodes, and distros. Additionally, cables are not automatically associated with anything, so a user interface needs to be provided with a way for making an association between the target object and the cable. Here's the deal. There needs to be a user interface (UI) to assign cables to targets. Part of this is currently done with the "Assign Multicable Circuits..." and the "Circuit Assign Preferences..." commands. Currently these command only provide for assigning the Multicable Cable ID and Breakout Circuit# to a fixture when a user clicks on that fixture. There is no handling of Jumper cable data or Data cable data, and there are no commands that assign Data cable info anywhere. It is conceivable that the two commands, "Make Jumper Cable Chain..." and "Make Data Cable Chain" could handle some of this, but see below. However, there is another part of this that requires a UI for picking which target the cable is attaching to. You might think that is obvious, but the choice has to be made before the object is picked, because the user has to pick which fields to put information in. The only hard and fast rule here is that IF the target is a Lighting Device(LD) then the Multicable-Cable ID is assigned to the LD Circuit Name field and the and the Multicable-Breakout Circuit Number is assigned the the LD Circuit Number Field. If the Target is not a LD, the the UI must provide for their assignment. All other value assignments from target to cable need to be user determined with a UI to do so. Here are some requests that I have received from my users. Where you see "Target" think Lighting Device, but it could also be a Hoist or some other object that needs a cable 1. Place the Breakout Type in a Target user field... chosen by the user. 2. Place Multicable-Cable ID and the Multicable-Circuit # in a Jumper user field... chosen by the user. 3. Place the Jumper length in the Multicable--Breakout circuit field. 4. Place the Jumper length in a user selected Target field. 5. Place a user chosen Target field in the Multicable-Breakin circuit field, e.g. Dimmer or Breaker ID. 6. Place the Jumper connector type in a user chosen Target field, e.g. LD user field... chosen by the user. 7. Place a Target's unit number, if it exists, in a Jumper user field... chosen by the user. 8. Place a Target's position, if it exists, in the Jumper's Location field. Now the UI for this needs to be some sort preference dialog, because you don't want to have to make all of these choices every time you pick the "Assign Circuits" command. This also points out, again, that currently cables are not automatically assigned to anything unless the user specifically picks a command to do so. I would say that is as it should be. This is going to result in a rather daunting UI, and one that may violate all sorts of UI guidelines. Below is a Dialog box that I am currently implementing to provide the functionality above. It is not, I repeat not, yet shipping with AutoPlot Tools for Spotlight, but I hope it will soon. If this works as desired, there is no guarantee that any of this functionality will rush into VW. Considering the needs of Vision and Braceworks which are both very large undertakings and hugely important to our industry, I think tabling cables for the moment is understandable. Additionally, some of this has required additions and changes to the cable objects themselves. I think VW understands the importance of the functionality you request, and I'm sure that it is in their their thoughts. That it is "on the list" may be a very frustrating response, but there are a lot of people putting requests on the list. I am not all that happy with the above dialog, but it will have to do for now, or it will never ship. Additionally, none of this addresses the assignment of Data Cable parameters or the assignment of values to Data Cable fields. Remember that any time you draw jumpers or data cables using the path object and not a command, there is no way for that cable to know that it is attached to something. The UI will need to provide for the choosing between Data Cable and Jumper Cable to receive particular values. Cables touch everything in our industry, so I'm afraid that all the functionality that can be imagined will take a long time to implement, but I am sure VW has not abandoned giving more functionality to cables. Please do not take this as a tirade against your request. Wanting more is the only thing that makes us progress. I just want to make all of they issues clear about an issue that seems simpler than it really is. Sam 5 Quote Link to comment
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