Software release 28/06/2021

[JuKu]

New software release, date 28.06.2021:

Installation file: https://liteplacer.com/Downloads/LitePl ... 6_2021.exe

* Added frame rate measurement to camera setup
* Added also the nominal frame rate promise from the camera
* AForge vision libraries updated; this should give better video performance
* Warning for measurement using default pixel size
* Box now zooms with the rest of the display

But do read the announcement for the previous major release here!

[gahorth]

Hi Juha,

I've just downloaded this latest software, although I've not actually tried it with my machine yet.
However, I've taken the liberty to (in my opinion) tidy up some of the forms. I hope I'm not offending you!!
Anyway... I've made the components resize when you resize the main form, and also made the grid columns resize. It works better for me. I've also made some of the forms 'dialog' and removed the control box, as most didn't need to be sizeable.

I've attached the updated .Designer.cs files. The originals were taken from github today, so are as up-to-date as I can get. I'm sure you could compare with KDiff or something similar to check the differences. It would be nice to commit to the GIT repository, but I don't use GIT (yet) I'm afraid.

Hope these are of help. Please include the changes (assuming you're happy with them) in the next release.

Best regards,
Gareth

[JuKu]

Thank you! Sounds good, and I’ll have a deep look when my computer works again.

[Vbhunt]

Notes of new software installation ( Both early June 2021 and late June 2021 versions )

General Notes:
1. Suggestion. I recommend an "about Liteplacer menu." that gives the software version number and the hardware versions it supports.
2. Question. Is the HOME point set to X=0.000,Y=0.000? If so what is the meaning of the small numbers after homing completes -- since HOME on the camera is always set to the exact center of the HOME circle shouldn't it always be (0.000,0.000)? The small numbers I get range from (-0.044 <= x <= 0.029 ) and (0.014 <= y <= 0.044).
3. Suggestion. I've noticed that the angular position of the limit detector switches (actually the sense arm length and angle) impacts the sensitivity to declare a limit error. When homing the nozzle tower, if the angle of the sense arm is such that its edge travel exceeds the back off distance the switch can remain depressed and thus an error is sensed. Perhaps it would be good to have a short explanation of this so that the builder can position the angles of the limit switches appropriately. It took me a lot of fiddling to discover and understand this relationship (which in hindsight seems pretty obvious!?).
4. Issue. On "Basic Setup" panel. It appears that the Z tab on the "Axes Setup (TinyG board):" area; the check boxes, "Homing switch used", "Min limit switch used" and "Max limit switch used" gets reset at some point after I experienced a "Unhandled Exception" error. I got the exception when I tried to save the Nozzle Setup Panel "Load" array using the "Save Values" button on the "Setup Nozzles" panel. I said to ignore the exception and then immediately exited the program hoping to save the array values I'd just typed in. After restarting the program, I set the three check boxes on the Z tab and saved the "Control Board Settings". Then moved the PNP to the pickup point to clean the Nozzle holder in prep for setting up the Nozzles on "Setup Nozzles" panel. I selected the "Setup Nozzles" panel and started filling in the Load Array. At that time, the "Home machine now?" dialog popped up. I selected "yes" and got, "Z homing switch not enabled.(Abort or crash during probing? If so, please re-enable.)" in the command response text box. I flipped back to the "Basic Setup" panel. When I looked at the Axes Setup Z tab all the check boxes were set. I then clicked the red Home button and the check boxes were recognized and the PNP machine homed. This anomaly appeared to stay across program restarts. When in the "Setup Nozzles" panel, selecting the "Home" big button regardless of color causes the "Z homing switch not enabled"... error and no homing. Flipping back to the "Basic Setup" panel and pressing the "Home" big button there cause the PNP machine to home. I've tried to save the application settings and restart the program but once in the "Setup Nozzles" panel, I get the "Z homing switch not enabled"... error across LitePlacer program restarts. The machine homes in every other panel except the "Setup Nozzles" panel. "Z homing switch not enabled..." error still observed in the 6/28/2021 release with same behavior described above.
5. Homing Timeout Suggestion. Alter the timeout interrupt to call a routine to check to see if the homing dialog should be presented. This algorithim should check to see if the PNP machine has moved since the last home. If not, the machine is already at home and there is no need to re-home it. Could you develop an automatic "just in time" homing mechanism so that the machine is automatically homed when the following conditions are met:
1. The machine has not been homed for a given timeout period since the last move.
2. A new move is requested.
I presume that the need for the time based homing is to assure maximum accuracy of machine movement. I believe the above approach will also achieve the accuracy objective and minimize the intrusive re-home dialog that periodically pops up. Perhaps it would eliminate the need for the "Home machine now?" dialog box.

Basic Setup panel:
1. I thought acceleration is measured in (distance/(time^2)). If so the label should be 10^6mm/min^2. (i.e. the rate of change of velocity.)

2. The check box for "Slack Compensation,rot" looks too much like "Slack Compensation, not" and is confusing. Suggest "Rotate Compensation".

3. Squareness Web page.
Same as before. Well written and very clear.

4. Special Locations web page.
1. Up camera position is NOT already setup. Is this part of "Nozzle Setup?".
2. I assume that "Nozzle Setup" in the "Setup Video Processing" is missing from the web page flow. Since I knew how to do it, I went ahead and did the full Nozzle setup at this point in the re-calibration for the new software. This page needs to be put back into the web page calibration flow. (The nozzle setup web page is easy to follow and adds confidence that the calibration is being accomplished.)

Setup Cameras panel:

1. connecting-cameras Web page.

1. There is no "Fast" check box visible to check.
2. Setup Cameras Panel is now much cleaner -- good change to the UI.
3. Draw Side marks is a good innovation. Are the ticks at 1 CM? i.e. There is a need to document the dist between side marks. Also there needs to be a way to make ticks more visible: Perhaps, Magenta not red?
2. downlooking-camera-setup Web page.
1. (Fixed in 6/28/21 release). Under Heading: "Set the Camera Units, so that the box fits in the image." is not meaningful for the higher resolution since the box is always drawn at the same size. It always fits in the image. Checking "Show pixels" enlarges images to show maximum lines in the image.
2. Continuing the discussion about 1 above. I tried a magnification of 0.5. The error message "Zoom factor must be >1" should be changed to "Zoom factor must be >=1" since 1 is an allowed factor -- or consider changing the minimum zoom factor to be 0.1 (i.e 10x magnification).

Setup Video Processing Panel:

1. vision-processing-setup Web page:

1. Change "Vision Processing Setup" page title on page at https://liteplacer.com/vision-processing-setup to "Setup Video Processing" so as not to confuse the reader.
2. Change all occurrences (including title) on current page "Vision Processing Setup" to "Setup Video Processing" to align application and web site.
3. New explanation of video processing setup is much clearer than old one. Nice improvement.
4. New video processing setup worked great for my home mark. All I needed was search for round features, threshold function at 190 and (min/max of 1.0/5.0). I have a white dot on black background.
2. squareness Web page:
1. Excellent squaring mechanism. Clear instructions and it works great.
3. special-locations Web page:
1. Excellent, clear page. Also the bookmarks are very useful.

Setup Nozzles Panel:

1. automatic-nozzle-chage-setup Web page:

1. The mouse right-click menu item, "Copy unload start positions from Load end positions" does not work correctly for nozzle 6 Start Z value. The "Start Z" value inserted for nozzle 6 is 40.000 when it should be 0.000.
2. This page is written for a vertically mounted Nozzle Tray. A paragraph is needed to explain that a horizontally mounted Nozzle tray works as well. My nozzle tray is set near the maximum video Y value. In this configuration the nozzles are 22mm apart in the X direction.
3. This page and the pictures are a definite improvement. Pictures are good illustration of what is going on here.
4. Suggestion. Why can't the vision system be used to automatically center the nozzle head right over nozzle? To put it another way, if the vision system can identify and pickup components off a periodic component tape knowing the pitch and offset, why can't the nozzle holder be treated like a special tape with the nozzles being the component to be picked up?
5. Check box, "Nozzle Change Enable" is not checked, yet nozzle changes proceed as if it is checked.
6. Note the "Z homing switch not enabled.(...)" error in the associated panel capture. Note also the red "Home" large button indicating that the machine needs to be homed. It appears that entering the "Setup Nozzles" panel and then engaging the "Home" button causes this error.

[Dloranger]

Just installed the software package.

Connect comport - successful
Home now dialog - NO
Restore defaults (control board settings) - appears to work
Restore defaults (app setting) - application crashes.

What am I missing here?

[Dloranger]

Unsafe behavior ? I notice when I swipe with 2 fingers on my trackpad (to attempt to zoom or such) there are settings being updated in the console menu. I think this is unintended behavior? Its certainly unexpected for me as a first time user

[JuKu]

Unsafe behavior ? I notice when I swipe with 2 fingers on my trackpad (to attempt to zoom or such) there are settings being updated in the console menu. I think this is unintended behavior? Its certainly unexpected for me as a first time user

Not wanted behaviour, certainly! Please send me the log window content when that happens (click inside the log window, ctrl+A to select all, copy and paste to a text document). I can see from that how the software sees the swipe.