Eclipse Community Forums: 4DIAC - Framework for Distributed Industrial Automation and Control » 4DIAC

Home » Eclipse Projects » 4DIAC - Framework for Distributed Industrial Automation and Control » 4DIAC - Composite Function Block

4DIAC - Composite Function Block [message #1809554]

Thu, 18 July 2019 03:21

Eclipse User

Hello,

I got a question re creating a composite function block. Do you have to export the cpp and h files followed by a recompilation of Forte? Or can you merely build the composite in 4DIAC and use them without compilation into Forte? When we follow the example, and then try and added watches to the composite FB, they show N/A on input and outputs, but they do deploy, seemingly without errors.

Best Regards

Re: 4DIAC - Composite Function Block [message #1809587 is a reply to message #1809554]

Thu, 18 July 2019 10:58

Eclipse User

Hi,

Composite FBs have to be compiled into FORTE.

Best,
Martin

Re: 4DIAC - Composite Function Block [message #1809591 is a reply to message #1809587]

Thu, 18 July 2019 11:17

Eclipse User

To add to Martins comment you could look at subapplicatuions. Subapplications (typed, or un-typed) are flattened during deployment and therefore do not need to be compiled.

Also I would recommend to look at the work our Google Summer of Code Student Jan is doing. He is improving our dynamic type loading feature. He posted some messages with further information in our news sections as well as in the developer mailing list.

Cheers,
Alois

Re: 4DIAC - Composite Function Block [message #1809921 is a reply to message #1809554]

Thu, 25 July 2019 12:51

Eclipse User

Thanks for your answers.

We are following 4diac tutorial to include bespoke blocks in forte . I got a questing regarding generating attributes FORTE_EXTERNAL_MODULES_DIRECTORY
FORTE_MODULE_EXAMPLE_TEST in Cmake form command line as oppose of using GUI . i.e. tutorial says Generate first and then Configure, not sure how that can be executed form command line/docker.

We are using Dockerfile to build forte, here is the relevant part of the code

# FORTE BUILD
&& cd /root \
&& git clone -b 1.10.2 https://git.eclipse.org/r/4diac/org.eclipse.4diac.forte forte \
&& git clone https://github.com/mariuszbalon/ext_modules forte_ext \
&& cp -r /root/forte_ext /root/forte \
&& cd forte \
&& chmod +x setup_posix.sh \
&& bash ./setup_posix.sh \
&& cd bin/posix \
&& cmake -G "Unix Makefiles" -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Debug \
-DFORTE_COM_LOCAL=ON -DFORTE_TESTS=OFF \
-DFORTE_MODULE_CONVERT=ON -DFORTE_MODULE_UTILS=ON \
-DFORTE_ARCHITECTURE=Posix \
-DFORTE_EXTERNAL_MODULES_DIRECTORY=/root/forte/ext_modules \
-DFORTE_MODULE_EXAMPLE_TEST=ON \
-DFORTE_COM_ETH=ON -DFORTE_MODULE_IEC61131=ON \

TIA
Regards

Re: 4DIAC - Composite Function Block [message #1809926 is a reply to message #1809921]

Thu, 25 July 2019 14:31

Eclipse User

I see that you are using already the setup_posix.sh. I think instead of doing the cmake setup twice I would move the stuff from the posix_setup.sh to your docker file. Then you only have one invokation of cmake and everything nicely in one place. Also as we recommend now I would put the build dir parellel to the 4diac FORTE code. so instead of cding into forte performing a 'mkdir build' in the root build dir then cd into that and invoke cmake from there. Another reason for not using our setup_posix.sh directly is that this file enables a lot what you ma not need or what you should not for a production build fo 4diac FORTE (e.g., tests). Having now the 4diac FORTE cmake config in your docker file makes you indpeendent from our build settings and gives you clearer defined builds.

But yes it should work that way. We use it similarly for our jenkins build. However we currently don't have an external module here.

Re: 4DIAC - Composite Function Block [message #1809961 is a reply to message #1809926]

Fri, 26 July 2019 10:15

Eclipse User

You don't need to copy the external module inside the forte folder, and your are missing the main directory of forte at the end

&& cd /root \
&& git clone -b 1.10.2 https://git.eclipse.org/r/4diac/org.eclipse.4diac.forte forte \
&& git clone https://github.com/mariuszbalon/ext_modules forte_ext \
&& mkdir binPosix
&& cd binPosix \
&& cmake -G "Unix Makefiles" \
-DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Debug \
-DFORTE_COM_LOCAL=ON \
-DFORTE_TESTS=OFF \
-DFORTE_MODULE_CONVERT=ON \
-DFORTE_MODULE_UTILS=ON \
-DFORTE_ARCHITECTURE=Posix \
-DFORTE_EXTERNAL_MODULES_DIRECTORY=/root/forte_ext/ \
-DFORTE_MODULE_EXAMPLE_TEST=ON \
-DFORTE_COM_ETH=ON \
-DFORTE_MODULE_IEC61131=ON \
/root/forte
&& make -j4

Re: 4DIAC - Composite Function Block [message #1810223 is a reply to message #1809961]

Mon, 05 August 2019 06:08

Eclipse User

Alois/Jose , we followed your advices and it worked. Docker now builds fine with external FBs included.

Many thanks

Re: 4DIAC - Composite Function Block [message #1810244 is a reply to message #1810223]

Mon, 05 August 2019 17:17

Eclipse User

Mariusz,
great to hear that. I initially feared that we have an issue with the external modules option. Good that this is not the case.

Cheers,
Alois

Previous Topic:	Custom data type(Structured Datatypes)
Next Topic:	boot file throw error

Goto Forum:

-=] Back to Top [=-

Current Time: Wed Jul 23 14:35:07 EDT 2025

.:: Contact :: Home ::.

Breadcrumbs

Sign up to our Newsletter