On Wed, Jan 06, 2010 at 02:59:13PM +1100, Erik Christiansen wrote: > If we don't watch out, there is a risk that the only way to read or edit > our configuration files would be some GUI monstrosity! (Hopefully, I > exaggerate horribly. :-)
I sure sympathize with this worry. XML is very hostile to someone with a text editor. In the tlo_all_axes branch Michael G is working on changes that let you have arbitrary tool offsets instead of the current choices of only Z, X/Z, W. Part of this is choosing a new tool table format, and he chose to use something gcode-like (a letter followed by a number for each piece of information). I think this is a wise approach. It is easy for both programs and humans to deal with, and it is familiar and immediately understandable to all our users. Here is what the new tool table format looks like: http://git.linuxcnc.org/gitweb?p=emc2.git;a=blob;f=configs/sim/sim.tbl;hb=tlo_all_axes You can see tool number, pocket, diameter, Z offset, comment. A lathe would have some more words for each tool. A two-turret lathe might have some tools with Z and some with W, etc etc. This removes a lot of the mess we currently have where every feature change that touches the tool table has to either keep the number and order of columns the same, or break everyone's tool tables. For wear offsets I'm not sure what we'd want. One idea that comes to mind is to have a second tool table for those. It could have tool numbers and offsets but not pocket numbers or orientations. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ This SF.Net email is sponsored by the Verizon Developer Community Take advantage of Verizon's best-in-class app development support A streamlined, 14 day to market process makes app distribution fast and easy Join now and get one step closer to millions of Verizon customers http://p.sf.net/sfu/verizon-dev2dev _______________________________________________ Emc-users mailing list Emc-users@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/emc-users
