Adm Version 0.3 Release Notes

In this release many new widgets are included and old existing widgets are improved significantly compared with previous release 0.2. Currently there are 7 monitor widgets, 2 control/monitor widgets, 5 control widgets, 8 other widgets and many help classes in the ADM package.

2. New and changes:

• CCanvas class is split to two abstract class CCanvas and CAnimatedCanvas. New CCanvas class is responsible to post the minotorOn to control system to receive the updated information. It can use as the base class of widgets with simple graphics object. CAnimatedCanvas implements double buffering and can be used as base class of widgets with complicated graphics object.
• CFrame widget rename to CApplication. The window closing event is added to the CApplication widget. It also disconnect from the server before application exit.
• The display/control range on all widgets are converted to a pretty number (multiples of ten) using the defined algorithm. This is a significant improvement when using the auto range mode.
• The algorithm used to calculate the auto range is improved.
• CStripChart bean is modified to plot historical data when the display range changes.
• First introspetic widget - CDirectory is included in this release.
• The control function is added to CBits bean.
• The CRect and COval beans are extended to monitor Enum type of the device property.
• New widgets, CToggleButton, CMenuButton, CJavaMenuItem and CShellMenuItem are added to the package.
• Color mode property is added to CLabel and CTextField beans.
• CLabel class now can display both device property value and a string text.
• New constructor widgetName (String dName, String pName) is added to all control and monitor widgets.
• More and improved BeanInfo classes are provided to customize the property editor interface and image representation used in the visual development tool.
• The widget documentation is provided on the cdev web site.

• CFrame class is deprecated. As release 0.3, replaced by CApplication class.
• CText class is deprecated. As release 0.3, replaced by CLabel class.

• In this release, the beans rely on the control system to provide correct display range if the RANGE_FROM_PROPERTY style is selected. The user should set range style to RANGE_STATIC or RANGE_AUTO if the display high and display low have not been set properly.
• The custom property editor for some bean (CStripChart, CMenuButton etc.) is not provided in this release. These beans can only been used in non-visual IDE.
• This package is still in a early development stage, the beans are only been tested in NT and Linux platforms. Please report the problems and bugs to cdev@jlab.org.

The following features will be gradually added to the adm package in future releases:

• Provide custom editor for the beans with complicated property.
• Better handle the situation when the size of the widget is too small.
• Improve the error handling so an unconnected monitor will have an obvious and useful graphical presentation.
• Implement smart state monitor (elaborate).
• Complete the implementation of the CDirectory invisible bean.
• Provide more documentation and a tutorial.

For any comments and suggestion on the CDEV widgets, please send to cdev@jlab.org.

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