What is a plug-In

How many of you have played with Lego little bricks? A lot of people. That's that now the name Lego is synonym of game... Well, also the system designers of ChartView™ must have played with them, and even so much! But let's get back with the memory, if you remember, there was a base, then there were some little bricks; the rectangular ones to make the walls, that they fit on the base through those little round inserts; then there were some little bricks to make the windows and the doors, those for the tiles; then, they came those to make the vehicles and those to build the dinosaurs. Today those to build space-ships really!... But, if you remember, inevitably they come all together in a box and they mixed one another, so it ended that the pieces which made part of the kit for the space-ship were used to build a little fort, or those for the dinosaur were used to build a truck or a crane... All that happened because on the base there was the same system of inset for every little brick. We can say that Lego was the first example of interface. We could mix the little bricks among them and to recompose them, always getting different constructions according to the game we wanted to do.

Going back to the argument we have at heart, ChartView™ can compare with the mythical little base of start with its interface for the Plug-In connection, while that last are the little bricks the more you have, the more combinations you can do , therefore you can solve more situation.

In effect the plug-Ins are module of expansion, which do each a specific work, ChartView™ is able to load a reasonable number at the same time, and to make them work in a co-operative way with the internal functions in the same package. The plug-Ins are able to add or to let available additional windows both in phase of configuration and in phase os execution, by instance the Plug-Ins to display the Lay-Out, to add instructions to the V-Basic language, to interface various device, etc.

As the Plug-Ins installed in phase of configuration, during the phase of execution take up time of CPU, anyhow slowing down the work, it is always better to avoid to load plug-ins which during the execution of the program are not used by the same application.

How to use the Plug-Ins

Let's go back to the previous example, that of the bar-code reader and of the PLC. As we have many times underlined, ChartView™, is, as we usually say, blind and deaf, that means it is not able to connect, autonomously, with anything and, therefore, it can't acquire no values. It's like you bought the best CD player, today in production, and once arrived home it turned out that, nevertheless it is the best, without a CD, even the most horrible, and without the alimentation cable it is not equal to the task it was made for! In our case we need to read some values from a PLC and some other values from a bar-code reader, but this ChartView™ cannot do it, perhaps there would be the need to display a page of displaying which are some data just read from video, but, unfortunately, even this ChartView™ is not able to do it... We must insert the... alimentation cable: the Plug-In.

As a matter of fact, besides the metaphor used to make understand the situation, in effect, the eyes, the ears and the hands of ChartView™ are really the Plug-Ins. For our example it's enough to load the Plug-In, from the program of configuration, which enables the reading from the serial port, and, immediately, we have the chance to connect any device of colloquy with serial protocol with the computer and ChartView™ will be able to read any values from such device, in our case the bar-code reader. When it is loaded the specific Plug-In for the type of PLC with which we need to communicate, and ChartView™ will provide to change some values even with this device, and so on. it is rightly, the CD reader, when connected with the cable of alimentation with a electric socket and inserted the CD... Here it is the music.

How many and which, but, first of all how

Now, after having excessively magnified these mysterious objects of desire, you surely ask how many Plug-Ins are now available, for which kind of work, but, first of all, you ask how to get them, so to satisfy your thirst to know, here there are the answers.

Firstly how many is a question we aren't able to answer, the group of work dedicated to the making of some Plug-Ins is at full power working from much time and it has produced many Plug-Ins starting from those of common use till today, they are working to produce also those that should satisfy the requests of niche, that is those requests of limited use to certain applications that, for many reasons, must interface some special devices. We don't even say a certain number to avoid mistakes, as we are not able to say, at the moment we are writing, how many there will be at the moment you'll have in your hands this manual. But, answering the second question, that is which, we give an instance of the variety of ineffaceable devices with ChartView™, mentioning the principal Plug-Ins that you can ready find to satisfy your needs:

SIEMENS 3964 / 3964R

SIEMENS Sinec H1

SIEMENS Sinec L2+

Allen Bradley DH+ KTX /KTXD

Allen Bradley DH+ Linx

Modbus Protocol (serial)

GE Genius+

GE SNP (serial)

Telemecanique Modicon (serial)

Plug-Ins of communication with Measure Instruments:

Marposs (instruments of measure)

Mitutoyo Digimatic (Instruments of measure)+

Scanners Meteor (serial)

Scanners (serial)

Bilance Balmas (serial)

Plug-Ins of communication with special devices:

BOSCH Screwer

BOSCH riveter Presses

Atlas Copco Screwer MACS plus

Atlas Copco Screwer Tensor S7

Plug-Ins of I/O to video:

Alarm configuration (signaling, silence, displaying, etc.)

Lay-Outs loading 

Files management of type DWG and DXF (AutoCAD)

ACTIVE-X Box

The interfacing of the proprietary network happens by an additional hardware to be bought by the retailer of trust and it is not included in the furnishing price. These Plug-Ins ask for the purchase of a license of use by the producer of the device that you intend to use. The Plug-In interfaces a module provided by the producer of the device and, therefore, such license is not included in the purchasing price of the software package furnished with ChartView™. 

After the brief list of some Plug-Ins described above, it should result evident that each work which you are going to do must foresee the, or its Plug-Ins. For any further questions about it or, anyhow, on Web site of LSI you'll find a page dedicated to the argument, where you find a page of download to unload the last versions, too, the eventual patches and, especially, the KIT to develop on your own some Plug-Ins.
In fact, besides the Plug-Ins of common utility, we have thought about people who needs to communicate with the Hardware of proprietary type, too. In that case, the roads to follow are two, the first is the classical road of doing by yourself, you unload yourself from the Web site the KIT of development (it is free of charge), and you can write your Plug-In with the Visual C++ compiler; or you can ask us to realize the Plug-In which, obviously, once realized, become common patrimony of every user's ChartView™.

At the end the fatidic question: how much do they cost? Well, here the answer varies, surely you don't owe anything for the Plug-Ins which don't need any additional licenses, or anyhow any hardware cards to work, these are always available on Web site with the last releases, and, anyhow they are available on CD and they will accompany ChartView™. It is quite a different matter for those just made for the clients, because it will be given the news and, if, the client who has ordered, is interested, they can be included on the CD or on the Web site, free of charge, or by payment of the license which, obviously is pertaining the client.