Touch panels that supports list box commands.
MorgoZ
Posts: 116
Hello!
I already have a panel design for a TPI-PRO touch panel. And i?m using list boxes to show some data.
Now i need to migrate that design to a Modero VG1500 panel, with the surprise that it doesn?t support list boxes commands (^LDN, ^LDA, ^LDD, etc), so i need to ask you two questions:
1.- Is there a way to make a Modero VG1500 work with list boxes commands?? I?ve already updated it with the last firmware
2.- I suppose that the answer to the first question is negative, so i would like to know which AMX?s touch panels supports list boxes commands and which don?t.
Thanks for your help!!!
Salutes!!
I already have a panel design for a TPI-PRO touch panel. And i?m using list boxes to show some data.
Now i need to migrate that design to a Modero VG1500 panel, with the surprise that it doesn?t support list boxes commands (^LDN, ^LDA, ^LDD, etc), so i need to ask you two questions:
1.- Is there a way to make a Modero VG1500 work with list boxes commands?? I?ve already updated it with the last firmware
2.- I suppose that the answer to the first question is negative, so i would like to know which AMX?s touch panels supports list boxes commands and which don?t.
Thanks for your help!!!
Salutes!!
0
Comments
Thanks
Do you think that these are the only devices that supports list boxes???? Does anyone know if AMX is going to update the rest of touch pannels with list boxes???
Thanks.
Glad you piped in since none of this information is in the release notes.
Can you explain why people (AMX) try to slip things in to firmware updates without us knowing? It's getting old to be honest.
I haven't loaded up the latest firmware, but kudos to the department for finally implementing list boxes on all the panels.
Not really trying to slip anything in, but rather trying to keep things short and simple. If we had listed everything in detail that was changed on the recent sustaining release of the 8400, it would have been the size of a small novel.
Which would you rather have 50 page release notes that you have to dig through to find the important stuff, or a 1 page release not that just has the important stuff?
Disclaimer, opinions on what is important will vary.
When the forums are flooded with questions on list boxes and their panels, I would think it would be ranked up there.
And honestly - I'd love to know every little thing that's been fixed or was attempted to be fixed, that way I when I load it up I'm not confused as to why something isn't working or has changed (remember the XCH fiasco months / year ago?)
I?m probably telling you something you already know but the next version of the TPD4 help file needs updating to sync with the new firmware. The current release (TPD4 2.11 build 619) states:
Seriously? Rhetorical question: What possible motive would AMX have to be guilty of such an accusation?
Yup, I fully agree there. I know I?ve answered the same question several times myself and I?m glad I was wrong this last time.
Back at the topic at hand, the addition of list boxes sounds like a really good thing.
What have you all used them for before? Have they saved you time with coding and TP layout?
So, the short answer is that any new product released in the last 2 years or so supports list boxes. So, R4, 5100, 5150, 5200, TPI-PRO, and 500i.
If you could pass this question along to the firmware engineers: WHY THE HECK IS IT SO DIFFICULT TO DO THIS ON AN 8400?!? I mean seriously - what's the deal? It's quite pathetic that they can't include this on all of the touch panels. So lame that I question the ability of these engineers sometimes, or at least their bosses motives. I'm seriously concerned about the laziness down in TX sometimes.
All that being said, I would hope in the next release of the "old" panel's firmware that they include list boxes. This is about as stupid as holding off on fixing GET_LAST for years and years.
The problem is that you asking the wrong question. What is difficult about doing this on an 8400? Nothing. Why haven't we done it? That is a much better question.
Ok, so it is easy lets do it. I'll go spend some time implementing list boxes on the 8400. Ok, done, now I have list boxes on the 8400.
Now lets test it. We have something like 100 or so test cases we have for list boxes. On top of that we have to regression test to make sure we didn't break anything else. Even with all that testing, there is no assurances we will catch all the bugs that were introduced. This leads to a period of increased tech support activity for the products.
In the end it is a matter of priorities. We have a finite amount of resources, and we have to decide where that time and effort is best spent. Currently, there are things that are more important than implementing list boxes for the products that don't have them.
I can understand that there is a process, and that it takes and money, I truly can. However....
Who's priorities? And important to whom? The people who build these products (you, AMX, etc.) or the people that support AMX and purchase the products (us, our clients, etc.) If this is the *real* way of thinking - I can see how AMX might slip into oblivion by ignoring their dealer base, cutting off a 1/3 of them, increasingly make it difficult for all dealers and turning into a gestapo force against their dealers.
Let's look at some of your guys' more important features you recently put in the 8400 firmware: Boot time? Custom splash screens? Ability to read the battery base version? The panel's brightness? All these things were more important than the list box?
Again, I guess it really is whatever's important to you guys, and not the people who help pay everyone's salary at AMX.
How many times have you been coding a new feature and because of that one feature, you were able to add a couple of other features that were made possible because of what you added for the original change? I have had this happen and I always have a reaction similar to yours from the boss... I would have rather you worked on adding such and such instead of those 2 other features. What is hard to explain is that adding those two little features took only a couple of minutes because I had to do the work to support the original feature anyway.
Jeff
Great, this is a feature that everyone wants but can't use with any level of confidence as we all run into situations where a wireless panel gets changed into a wired panel and vice versa.
The REALLY aggravating thing that gets me annoyed is that there is one line hidden in the help file stating that only R4 panels are capable of implementing list boxes, but TPD4 alows you to create list boxes for any panel type. I have wasted hours trying to get list boxes working in the past before finding out that they were only supported on R4's.
I'm currently working on a project that has lists for scheduled actions, lists of text content for a ticker, lists of programmed content,... You get the idea.
Each list control I have to create from scratch wastes hours on the job. Given that it is available on the newer panels, I can't believe that AMX haven't made this functionality available across the board yet. It is sorely missed.
You can't copy a listbox from one panel to another so I tend not to use them and implement my own. What advantage does a list box give you?
Paul
At least that's how I had used it if memory serves me correctly. Correct me if I'm wrong - but isn't there a "sort" option too? Offloading tasks like this to the panel is nice IMO.
How does that work? The panel still needs the data doesn't it? Do you send the list data in one big dump and then it scrolls it internally? I have only used the one for the iPort but I never looked at how it worked that closely. The help file needs help in this regard.
Paul
I only did it once while looking at other possibilities of making a list on an R4 - it turned out not to work very well for my needs, so I abandoned it.
From what I've been able to glean in the past there are two separate modes of operation: dynamic and static. Static lists can be pre-populated in TPD4 when the panel is designed. List entries can be added and removed at run time in dynamic lists using send_commands available for the G4 panels that support them.
As jjames mentions, the key thing is that the handling of the list display, including scrolling, is offloaded to the panel. Text does not need to be sent to every button making up the list every time the user scrolls up or down. It should make the refreshing of lists a lot quicker and smoother.
Then you get into the situation ******** have historically had with their panels. There have traditionally been a number of different panel classes, with differing capabilities (eg. supporting transparency/not supporting transparency), based on different platforms and the integrator has had to produce different panel layouts from scratch for each type and couldn't reuse elements from other panel designs whilst keeping the design elegant or even acceptable in appearance.
If you want a new panel that's more acceptable in today's marketplace, buy an iPad/tablet and deal with the problems inherent to those devices. It's better than having a slew of unproven devices constantly entering the marketplace prematurely and failing to operate properly early on as has been the case with AMX panels in recent times.
I have had jobs in the past 12 months with what were then (and in some cases still are) current generation 7", 15" and 17" wired panels where listbox controls would have been a god send, but only tiny wireless panels supported the functionality. I could have bought a new small car for what the larger panels cost and yet the functionality in question was only available in wireless panels that are essentially glorified remote controls? Ridiculous!
In the case of new functionality like list box controls, we can't utilise them until they're integrated into the entire G4 range as we can't keep two separate code forks for new hardware/older hardware up to date.
How can we use list box control in a VC codec UI module for displaying directory entries if there's a chance that existing clients will install a codec in an existing system with an older (think NXT_CV7) touch panel? We can't as we can't possibly justify to the client $x000 additional expense to replace their touchpanel which may still be in its manufacturer warranty period when we add in the codec.
Paul