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Control System Studio
Introduction
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Control System Studio
Control System Studio (CSS) is several things.
To you as the end user it is this program, which combines tools suitable
for usage at the SNS, pre-configured to access the accelerator control
system's live and archived data.
Technically, CSS a collection of software tools for control systems
based on Eclipse, implemented by various people at different sites,
which can be combined such that they look like one product to the end user.
See
http://cs-studio.sourceforge.net
for details on the collaboration that creates CSS.
Welcome
When you start CSS for the very first time, you will see a "Welcome" screen
that includes an "Overview", "First Steps" etc. The Overview might have led
you to this help screen.
Use the "Restore" button on the window border to make the "Welcome" screen
smaller, or close it by pressing the "X" button next to the title.
The "restore" button:
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The "close" button:
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If you later want to return to the "Welcome" screen to read more,
you can access it via the "Help" menu, subsection "Welcome".
Getting Started
This selection of CSS Tools comes with a generic configuration that
you might have to adjust for your site-specific needs.
Project Folder
You should create at least one "Project" folder where you can save
Data Browser configurations or OPI files:
- Open Navigator (Menu File/Open Workspace Navigator)
- In Navigator, right-click, select "New", "Project ..."
- Select "General", "Project", click "Next"
- Enter project name, for example "CSS", click "Finish"
Preference Settings
- Click on the menu bar item "CSS", select "Preferences..."
to access the preference GUI.
- Locate the "CSS Core/EPICS" settings, configure the
Channel Access Address list to include your control system
subnets or Channel Access gateways.
- If you are using the Channel Archiver,
locate the "CSS-Applications/Trends/Data Browser" settings
and adjust them for your archive data server setup.
Some basic follow-along ideas to try as a first-time user:
Probe
- Click on the menu bar item "CSS", select "Diagnostic Tools", followed by
"Probe" to open the CSS Probe tool.
- Enter a PV Name from your control system,
press 'Enter' when done typing the name.
You should see the value of that PV.
If you don't have any control system,
try simulated PVs like "sim://sine".
More on PV names is in the online help under
"CSS-Applications/Configuration/Process Variables".
- Close Probe via the 'X' in its title bar.
- Re-open Probe via the "CSS" menu as before.
Note that the PV Name entry field has a drop-down box attached to it,
which contains the last few PV names that you entered,
so it's easy to re-inspect previously used PVs.
In case of connection problems or error messages, the network preferences
under the menu "CSS/Preferences...", subsection "CSS Core/EPICS", might
need adjustments.
Data Browser
- To start a new Data Browser instance, use the "CSS" menu
entry "Trends/Data Browser".
- On the empty graph, open the context menu (right-click),
select "Add PV", and enter a PV name.
- You should see a Strip-Chart of the channel's data.
If you don't, try the "stagger" button
or the other buttons on top of the plot to zoom/pan.
- Add another PV.
Per default it is on its own axis.
- Use the plot's context menu to open the "Properties", which allows
changes to the line color etc. as well as adding more PV names.
Change the axis indices so that both PVs are on the same Y-axis.
- In the Properties View, open the context menu of the PV list
(right-click while the mouse if for example over the color box of a PV).
The context menu has a "CSS" sub-entry of applications that accept PVs.
Select "Probe".
This should start a new instance of Probe on the selected PV.
Many CSS tools offer this type of shortcut: The context
menu on a PV allows you to send that PV to another tool.
- Try to close the plot via the 'X' in its title bar.
You will be asked if you want do save the current configuration to a file.
Select "Yes", select the "CSS" folder, and enter a file name like "plot".
- In the "Navigator" at the left side of the window, you should
now be able to open the "CSS" folder (click the triangle next to it)
and find the saved Data Browser configuration file in there.
Double-click it to open.
OPI
To try the OPI tool:
- Use "CSS" menu entry "Display/Install OPI Examples"
- In the Navigator, right-click on "BOY Examples/Main.opi"
and select "Open With../OPI Runtime"
Workbench
Become familiar with the general CSS workbench behavior:
The Data Browser plot, of which there could be more than one, will
stay in the center of the workbench, while you can arrange the
accessory views like the "Properties" or the "Probe"
views in various ways around the central area.
Try to move them around by dragging their title bar to a new location.
Note how the cursor shape changes to indicate how the view can be placed.
The arrangement of workbench windows is called a Perspective.
The name of the current perspective is
indicated by a label in the upper left screen corner.
The button to the left of the current perspective allows opening other
perspectives.
Use it for example to open the predefined "Data Browser" perspective
which might be useful for Data Browser related work.
Switch between perspectives by clicking on their title tab.
A right-click on their title opens a context menu that allows you to
save the current view layout under a
different name or restore the original layout of a perspective.
Help
Use the "Help/Help Contents" menu to open the help pages,
and read the CSS-Applications related entries.
"Help/Cheat Sheets..." contains step-by-step
instructions for selected tasks. Use the 'triangle'
in the Cheat Sheets view panel to open the drop-down
list of available sheets
Cheat Sheets:
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This packaging of CSS is provided by
http://ics-web.sns.ornl.gov/css.
Refer to
http://cs-studio.sourceforge.net
for general CSS questions.