daniel
04 Nov 04, 02:00 PM
http://www.clipsal.com/cis/CBusForums/neodltaa.jpg
About DLT Units
DLT Units ( Dynamic Labelling Technology ) contain a graphical display screen which can display a Label in association with each key on the unit. Labels can be a text string, pictographic symbols or a bitmap graphic.
A quick note about the term “key”. It’s important to clarify that we generally use “key” in reference to C-Bus input keys. In certain C-Bus units these aren’t always synonymous with physical keys, and this is the case with DLT Units. The DLT product has eight input keys ( or “virtual keys” ), and at any one time either input keys 1 to 4 or input keys 5 to 8 are shown on the display screen. The unit itself has five physical keys, four of which control the input keys currently displayed, and the fifth physical key is used to cycle to the other set of four input keys.
Each unit can display its Labels in up to eight different languages, and you can broadcast a language setting to the network to cause all DLTs on the network to switch their display to that language. The eight languages for a network can be selected from a list of more than 65 international languages. It’s worth noting that the Chinese language can select from 91 common Chinese terms pre-programmed into the unit.
About DLT Broadcasting
Dynamic Labelling uses a one-way broadcast system to transfer Labels to all DLT units on a Network. For commissioning, this works very differently to the usual communications between Toolkit and C-Bus units. It makes the assignment of labels to groups very fast when doing many DLT switches and it opens up the ability to have labels change on the fly (and although there are no Clipsal products which do that, they are coming).
You can also turn off the "Dynamic" part of the labels, which means that the unit allows a fixed label to be applied to each button. Once those labels have been set with Toolkit, they won't change, even if some neat future product is trying to change the labels of the groups associated with those keys.
It is *not* possible to retrieve the Labels already stored on a unit. For this reason, when you scan a new Network with DLT units into Toolkit, you will NOT see the current Labels from those DLT units in the Language Editor. The Group Labels will always appear to be blank. This is another reason why it's important to maintain a database instance of your networks.
Getting Started
We’ll assume that you have at least one DLT unit. If not, you can always work with a database instance, though it’s not quite as cool! (To create a database instance of a DLT Unit: select the Units node of your network, choose Add Unit, enter a Unit Code of “KEYML5” and Ok. Enter any Serial and Name you like). We’ll also assume that you have your network already scanned and transferred to a database, ie. your network and database views are nicely in sync, though again this is not necessary. It would also be an advantage for you to know your way around a Neo, Saturn or Reflection Unit, and be familiar with their dialogs.
DLT Unit Dialog
Before we get into Languages and Labels, let’s check out the DLT Unit. Select a DLT unit in either view and choose to “Edit Unit”.
http://www.clipsal.com/cis/CBusForums/dlttute1.jpg
You’ll see a dialog that looks very similar to the Neo Unit dialogs, and for good reason – the firmwares are very similar, though there are a number of important differences. The first one you’ll notice is that the keys are arranged vertically, with keys 1 to 4 on the left and keys 5 to 8 on the right. This is to reflect the physical design of the unit with the eight keys arranged in two pages of four and one page being controlled at a time.
The Unit Identification, Power Fail, Key Functions and Scenes tabs are essentially unchanged from their Neo counterparts.
Global tab
DLT units don’t have infra-red but they’ve acquired the ability to have their keys disabled by a Group on the Application, very effective for public areas or child lock implementations. IMPORTANT : Also ensure that the “Dynamic Labelling” option is checked, because otherwise the unit will not recognise the Labels you send to it. (Note : Early units were released with this option set Unchecked in the factory - there were not many released that way and it was back in 2004.)
Blocks tab
You no longer need to worry about the indicator block assignment, as they are automatically slaved to the key next to them.
Indicators tab
A number of changes here (see the screenshot above). The “Change brightness after a key is pressed” option has been tweaked into a “Key Press Activity” concept, where pressing a key is followed by an Activity Period during which the indicator brightness is changed. In addition you may choose to have the DLT unit fall back to displaying the first page after this period ends.
Screen Options allow the display to show or hide the level sliders or the clock, as well as inverting the display to its negative image of white on black. (Note: The Clock function requires some other unit (e.g. C-Touch) to issue Time commands on the C-Bus Time & Date Application, the Toolkit software does not yet have the capability to issue these commands).
The indicator nightlight can be activated separately on the four group-based keys and the page key, and the page key indicator can also be permanently on or off. Indicators are blue only (like Reflection) and their style can be configured separately for each of the eight input keys.
Scene Modify Keys
The eagle eyed among you would have already seen a new Function option “Scene Modify” in the Key Function combo boxes. This new feature allows detailed control (including ramping!) of Scenes. A Scene Modify Key always applies to the most recent Scene operated by a Scene Key. For a Scene Modify Key you can select virtually any On/Off, Ramping, Timer or Recall type function that you can on a normal Group Key.
To give a common example (as displayed in the screenshot above), you could set up Keys 1 and 2 to operate Scenes 1 and 2. Keys 3 and 4 would be Scene Modify Keys, with functions of “On Up” and “Off Down” respectively. After pressing Key 1 to invoke Scene 1, you can then use Keys 3 and 4 to control all the groups in that Scene. If you subsequently press Key 2 to invoke Scene 2, then Keys 3 and 4 would now apply to Scene 2.
The impact of this feature requires a Scene Key or a Scene Modify Key to now be associated with exactly one block, and that block is disabled from use by other keys. (Note : In other words it’s no longer possible to use the dangling Group on a Scene Key’s block for other nefarious purposes! Naughty!)
That pretty much wraps up the DLT Unit Dialog. You’ll notice there’s no mention of Labels or Languages in this dialog. That’s because Dynamic Labelling is performed at a Network level, and not a Unit-by-Unit level. Don’t worry we’ll cover that in the next section.
About DLT Units
DLT Units ( Dynamic Labelling Technology ) contain a graphical display screen which can display a Label in association with each key on the unit. Labels can be a text string, pictographic symbols or a bitmap graphic.
A quick note about the term “key”. It’s important to clarify that we generally use “key” in reference to C-Bus input keys. In certain C-Bus units these aren’t always synonymous with physical keys, and this is the case with DLT Units. The DLT product has eight input keys ( or “virtual keys” ), and at any one time either input keys 1 to 4 or input keys 5 to 8 are shown on the display screen. The unit itself has five physical keys, four of which control the input keys currently displayed, and the fifth physical key is used to cycle to the other set of four input keys.
Each unit can display its Labels in up to eight different languages, and you can broadcast a language setting to the network to cause all DLTs on the network to switch their display to that language. The eight languages for a network can be selected from a list of more than 65 international languages. It’s worth noting that the Chinese language can select from 91 common Chinese terms pre-programmed into the unit.
About DLT Broadcasting
Dynamic Labelling uses a one-way broadcast system to transfer Labels to all DLT units on a Network. For commissioning, this works very differently to the usual communications between Toolkit and C-Bus units. It makes the assignment of labels to groups very fast when doing many DLT switches and it opens up the ability to have labels change on the fly (and although there are no Clipsal products which do that, they are coming).
You can also turn off the "Dynamic" part of the labels, which means that the unit allows a fixed label to be applied to each button. Once those labels have been set with Toolkit, they won't change, even if some neat future product is trying to change the labels of the groups associated with those keys.
It is *not* possible to retrieve the Labels already stored on a unit. For this reason, when you scan a new Network with DLT units into Toolkit, you will NOT see the current Labels from those DLT units in the Language Editor. The Group Labels will always appear to be blank. This is another reason why it's important to maintain a database instance of your networks.
Getting Started
We’ll assume that you have at least one DLT unit. If not, you can always work with a database instance, though it’s not quite as cool! (To create a database instance of a DLT Unit: select the Units node of your network, choose Add Unit, enter a Unit Code of “KEYML5” and Ok. Enter any Serial and Name you like). We’ll also assume that you have your network already scanned and transferred to a database, ie. your network and database views are nicely in sync, though again this is not necessary. It would also be an advantage for you to know your way around a Neo, Saturn or Reflection Unit, and be familiar with their dialogs.
DLT Unit Dialog
Before we get into Languages and Labels, let’s check out the DLT Unit. Select a DLT unit in either view and choose to “Edit Unit”.
http://www.clipsal.com/cis/CBusForums/dlttute1.jpg
You’ll see a dialog that looks very similar to the Neo Unit dialogs, and for good reason – the firmwares are very similar, though there are a number of important differences. The first one you’ll notice is that the keys are arranged vertically, with keys 1 to 4 on the left and keys 5 to 8 on the right. This is to reflect the physical design of the unit with the eight keys arranged in two pages of four and one page being controlled at a time.
The Unit Identification, Power Fail, Key Functions and Scenes tabs are essentially unchanged from their Neo counterparts.
Global tab
DLT units don’t have infra-red but they’ve acquired the ability to have their keys disabled by a Group on the Application, very effective for public areas or child lock implementations. IMPORTANT : Also ensure that the “Dynamic Labelling” option is checked, because otherwise the unit will not recognise the Labels you send to it. (Note : Early units were released with this option set Unchecked in the factory - there were not many released that way and it was back in 2004.)
Blocks tab
You no longer need to worry about the indicator block assignment, as they are automatically slaved to the key next to them.
Indicators tab
A number of changes here (see the screenshot above). The “Change brightness after a key is pressed” option has been tweaked into a “Key Press Activity” concept, where pressing a key is followed by an Activity Period during which the indicator brightness is changed. In addition you may choose to have the DLT unit fall back to displaying the first page after this period ends.
Screen Options allow the display to show or hide the level sliders or the clock, as well as inverting the display to its negative image of white on black. (Note: The Clock function requires some other unit (e.g. C-Touch) to issue Time commands on the C-Bus Time & Date Application, the Toolkit software does not yet have the capability to issue these commands).
The indicator nightlight can be activated separately on the four group-based keys and the page key, and the page key indicator can also be permanently on or off. Indicators are blue only (like Reflection) and their style can be configured separately for each of the eight input keys.
Scene Modify Keys
The eagle eyed among you would have already seen a new Function option “Scene Modify” in the Key Function combo boxes. This new feature allows detailed control (including ramping!) of Scenes. A Scene Modify Key always applies to the most recent Scene operated by a Scene Key. For a Scene Modify Key you can select virtually any On/Off, Ramping, Timer or Recall type function that you can on a normal Group Key.
To give a common example (as displayed in the screenshot above), you could set up Keys 1 and 2 to operate Scenes 1 and 2. Keys 3 and 4 would be Scene Modify Keys, with functions of “On Up” and “Off Down” respectively. After pressing Key 1 to invoke Scene 1, you can then use Keys 3 and 4 to control all the groups in that Scene. If you subsequently press Key 2 to invoke Scene 2, then Keys 3 and 4 would now apply to Scene 2.
The impact of this feature requires a Scene Key or a Scene Modify Key to now be associated with exactly one block, and that block is disabled from use by other keys. (Note : In other words it’s no longer possible to use the dangling Group on a Scene Key’s block for other nefarious purposes! Naughty!)
That pretty much wraps up the DLT Unit Dialog. You’ll notice there’s no mention of Labels or Languages in this dialog. That’s because Dynamic Labelling is performed at a Network level, and not a Unit-by-Unit level. Don’t worry we’ll cover that in the next section.