cancel
Showing results for 
Search instead for 
Did you mean: 
cancel
Showing results for 
Search instead for 
Did you mean: 

Community Tip - Need help navigating or using the PTC Community? Contact the community team. X

Vuforia Studio and Chalk Tech Tips

Sort by:
How can ThingWorx (external) data be used to update an experience in real-time? For example, if the data does not fall within a specified range, warning messages will be shown automatically.     In ThingWorx, in Thing, create a Service to check the range and to determine if a warning should be displayed or not. In Vuforia Studio, in the Project, in DATA panel, under External Data section, add the Service. Under Configuration section, check all checkboxes related to refresh to call this Service. Use the ServiceInvokeComplete Event to check the value reported by the Service        
View full tip
1.) The first point  here is to clarify : is it possible to extract model data of 3d models in Vuforia Studio?  ( data could be extracted by Creo View Toolkit apps but here is considered only the Vuforia Studio environment) Supposing , we have a model widget for an assembly model without explicit modelitem  widget definitions. The question is: Can we extract data for the components and if yes,  then what data we can extract? In Vuforia Studio Environment Extracting of data is possible only in Preview mode, because we have in preview mode the method tml3dRenderer.GetObject() where we can access a model object (a component) example:   let comp_widget=tml3dRenderer.GetObject(selection).GetWidget()   where the selection is some thing like "<modelname>-<compPath>" e.g. : "model-1-/0/0/3/2"   Then from the widget we can extract data:   var loc=tml3dRenderer.GetObject(selection).GetWidget().GetLocation() console.error("DEBUG getObj.GetWidget()") console.warn(tml3dRenderer.GetObject(selection).GetWidget())   When we   explore  the different methods in the crome debugging console,  we will find methods to  get or  to set  properties. To extract data, we can use the get... methods.   The methods of  tml3dRenderer.GetObject() seems currently not to work in Vuforia View on end devices (the tml3dRenderer object is a handle of the cordova vuforia plug in and it has a different implementation on the different end devices.In preview mode so far I know, the graphic is based on WebGL and Three.js)  Therefore we will be not able for example to get the data of a component selection on the end device. So means we need a way to extract data in Preview mode and make it available in the Vuforia view on the end device.  Here I did not find a methods to extract the original component name but I was able to create a list (json) with the position data ( I did not add color but this is possible to access it - e.g. tml3dRenderer.GetObject(selection).GetWidget().GetColor()) We can create a json  e.g. of  following data:   {"model-1-/0/0/0":{"valid":false,"orientation":{"x":0,"y":0,"z":0}, "size":{"x":1,"y":1,"z":1},"scale":{"x":1,"y":1,"z":1}, "position":{"x":9.999999998199587e-24,"y":9.999999998199587e-24,"z":9.999999998199587e-24}}, "model-1-/0/0":{"valid":false,"orientation":{"x":0,"y":0,"z":0},"size":{"x":1,"y":1,"z":1}, "scale":{"x":1,"y":1,"z":1},"position":{"x":0,"y":0,"z":0}}, "model-1-/0/0/2":{"valid":false,"orientation":{"x":0,"y":90,"z":0},"size":{"x":1,"y":1,"z":1}, "scale":{"x":1,"y":1,"z":1},"position":{"x":0,"y":0.029500000178813934,"z":-5.51091050576101e-18}}, ...}   we can  assign the json to a variable e.g. $scope.COMP_LOCs So later we can read the current position data on end device:   var selection_location=$scope.COMP_LOCs[l_currentSelection] //read the location data from json varible console.log("selection:"+l_currentSelection+"->X= "+ selection_location.position.x); //print it to console selection_location.position.x= round(parseFloat(selection_location.position.x) + 0.005,4) //add 0.005 shift and round to 4 dec   2.)In point 1.)  we checked how to  extract the data of an compoent (a selection) .But Actually  we have a couple of methods to extract the data but what we do not have is a valid  selection of an assembly  component . This is required to obtain a valid modelitem widget (temporar) via tml3dRenderer.GetObject(). For the selection generation we have the model widget name e.g. “model-1” but   we do not have the component ID paths. To be able to construct a selection handle we need to construct the ID path of a component and then we need to check if it exist. This is some kind of graph search where we have an assembly with a components tree.  There the edges are the ids of the components. e.g. /0/0/1/1 , /0/0/1/2, /0/0/1/4, … etc. One possible algorithm is the deep first search:     To implement this I used the following javaScript code:   ///////////////////////////// var max_asm_depth=6; //this is the max depth in Creo Parametric var max_numb_comp_asm=25; /////////////////////////// ->deep first function check_comp_deep_first_recursively(target,path,arr) { //console.warn("called check_comp_deep_first_recursively(target="+target+",path="+path+")"); var selection = target+'-'+path var path_array = path.split('/') var depth = parseInt(path_array.length) var num = parseInt(path_array[depth -1]) var prev_num = parseInt(path_array[depth -2]) var prev_path = '' for (var i=1;i < depth -1;i++) {prev_path= prev_path +'/' + path_array[i]} if( check_for_valid_selection(selection) == 1) { arr[selection]=tml3dRenderer.GetObject(selection).GetWidget().GetLocation() if( (depth+1) < max_asm_depth) check_comp_deep_first_recursively(target, path + '/0', arr) else { if(num +1 < max_numb_comp_asm) check_comp_deep_first_recursively(target, prev_path + '/'+(num +1), arr)} } else { var right_num = num +1 if(right_num < max_numb_comp_asm) check_comp_deep_first_recursively(target, prev_path + '/'+right_num, arr) else if(!Number.isNaN(prev_num) ) {//console.log("--2") prev_path = '' for (var i=1;i < depth -2;i++) {prev_path = prev_path +'/' + path_array[i]} prev_path = prev_path +'/' + (prev_num +1) check_comp_deep_first_recursively(target, prev_path , arr) } } } ////////////////////////// ///call of the function: $scope.compJSON_loc_Data = new Object(); var target="model-1" check_comp_deep_first_recursively(target,'/0',$scope.compJSON_loc_Data) ...   The code above has the following weak spot - I need to give the maximum depth (max_asm_depth) and the maximum possible branches (max_numb_comp_asm)  The maximum depth currently in Creo assembly is 25 so that value which > 25 will not make a sense.  The value of  max_numb_comp_asm  in a flat assembly (only one level of depth) corresponds to the number of the components - the maximum number of branches on particular level of depth   The another possible algorithm is the breadth first search:     To implement this  I used the following JavaScript code:   ///////////////////////////// var max_asm_depth=6; //this is the max depth in Creo Parametric var max_numb_comp_asm=25; /////////////////function check_comp_at_level(target,num,depth,arr) // ->breadth first function check_comp_at_level(selection,num,depth,arr) { var position =''; // console.log("call check_comp_at_level =>"+selection); try{ // console.log("====== check here ==========="); //console.warn(tml3dRenderer.GetObject(selection).GetWidget().GetLocation()); var loc=tml3dRenderer.GetObject(selection).GetWidget().GetLocation() if( (loc.scale.x == 0) || (loc.scale.y == 0) || (loc.scale.z == 0) ) return 0; // the scale could not be zero //position= tml3dRenderer.GetObject(selection).GetWidget().GetLocation().position //console.warn(position); //arr[selection]=position arr[selection]=loc return arr[selection]; } catch (e) {console.error("failsed with error="+e); return 0;} } /////////////////////////// function check_comp_at_level_recursively(selection,depth,arr) { //console.warn("called check_comp_at_level_recursively("+selection+",depth="+depth+")"); var num =0; if(depth >= max_asm_depth) { //console.log("maximum depth of max_asm_depth ="+max_asm_depth+" reached"); return 0;} for (num=0;num < max_numb_comp_asm; num++) { var currentSelection =selection+'/'+num if(depth <0) return 0; var pos = check_comp_at_level(currentSelection,num,depth,arr) if(pos ==0 ) { continue;} else {check_comp_at_level_recursively(currentSelection,(depth+1),arr) } } //end of for } ////////////////////////// //////////////////////////////// function check_for_valid_selection(selection) { //console.log(" check_for_valid_selection =>"+selection); try{ var loc=tml3dRenderer.GetObject(selection).GetWidget().GetLocation() if( (loc.scale.x == 0) || (loc.scale.y == 0) || (loc.scale.z == 0) ) return 0; return 1; } catch (e) {console.error("failsed with error="+e); return 0;} } /////////////////////////// ///call of the function: $scope.compJSON_loc_Data = new Object(); var target="model-1" check_comp_at_level_recursively(target,'/0',$scope.compJSON_loc_Data) ...     The code for the breadth first search uses also the parameters for maximum depth (max_asm_depth) and the maximum possible branches (max_numb_comp_asm)  - so means it have the mentioned  restriction. If we set a value which is large this will increase the time until the search is completed so therefore depending of the particular assembly we need to set the both parameter properly ( we need to be able to scan the whole assembly but to minimize the search time) For different assemblies the first deep or first breadth could lead to better results. For example, for flat assembly structures the better approach will be to use the first breadth algorithm  But actually the performance is not so important here, because the search will be called one time and  then the json list should be saved.  With the current functionality we can read a file (json file ) from the project  upload directory , but it seems that it is  not  possible to save the information to a e.g. json file there (upload folder). To read a json file form the upload folder we can use some code like this:     target='model-1' $http.get('app/resources/Uploaded/' + jsonFile).success(function(data, status, headers, config) { $scope.compJSON_mod=data; // in this case the data is the received json object angular.forEach(data , function(color, path_id){ $scope.compJSON_Data[path_id] =position; console.log("target="+target+" --> $scope.compJSON_Data["+path_id+"] = "+$scope.compJSON_Data[path_id]); });//end of the error function ////////// finish for each path_id }) .error(function(data, status, headers, config) {console.log("problem in the http will create a new ");   When we want to save data  (the generated json list) we need to use another workaround - we can use a thingworx repository. Following functions /events could be used to save and receive an json object to/from a twx repository:   // the methods SaveJSON and LoadJSON // for the repository object should have //run permision for es-public-access user ////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// $scope.SaveJsonToTwxRepository = function(path, content) { $scope.$applyAsync(function() { $rootScope.$broadcast('app.mdl.CAD-Files-Repository.svc.SaveJSON', {"content": content, "path":path} );} ,500 ); }; ////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// $scope.GetJsonFromTwxRepository = function(path) { $scope.$applyAsync(function() { $rootScope.$broadcast('app.mdl.CAD-Files-Repository.svc.LoadJSON', {"path":path} );} ,500 ); $scope.app.speak("after call of GetJsonFromTwxRepository") //in the modelloaded listener register // LoadJSON-complete event -> to laod the data into session rootScope.$on('modelLoaded', function() { //// $scope.$root.$on('LoadJSON-complete', function(event, args) { console.log("LoadJSON-complete event"); $scope.COMP_LOCs=args.data console.log(JSON.stringify( $scope.COMP_LOCs)) }); /// });   In  the code above I use the 'modelloaded' listener to register LoadJSON-complete event . Because the service is called asyncronously- we need this event to load the data into session when it is received from thingworx. Here in this example the repository object is named "CAD-Files-Repository" The Thingworx services should have run permission and it is required to be added in the external data panel :     So when we start the project in PREVIEW mode we can call the search for the assembly structure and save it then  to thingworx. In Vuforia View mode   then we can receive the previously saved json object from thingworx. To check the current mode (if Preview or End Device)  we can use    if(twx.app.isPreview() == true) ...   it will  check if the current mode is preview mode or Vuforia View on the end device - here an example of the workflow:   if(twx.app.isPreview() == true) {// preview mode //calling breadth first - test check_comp_at_level_recursively(target+'-',0,$scope.compJSON_POS_Data) //console.warn($scope.compJSON_POS_Data) //calling deep first a second test and generating a data - locations check_comp_deep_first_recursively(target,'/0',$scope.compJSON_loc_Data) console.log("========================================") console.log("$scope.compJSON_POS_Data ->breadth first") console.log("========================================") console.log(JSON.stringify($scope.compJSON_POS_Data)) console.log("========================================") console.log("") console.log("") console.log("========================================") console.log("$scope.compJSON_loc_Data ->deep first") console.log("========================================") console.log(JSON.stringify($scope.compJSON_loc_Data)) $scope.SaveJsonToTwxRepository('/CADFiles/json_lists/compJSON_loc_Data.json',$scope.compJSON_loc_Data) $scope.GetJsonFromTwxRepository('/CADFiles/json_lists/compJSON_loc_Data.json') console.log("========================================") console.log("") } else { //here is the part on mobile device $scope.GetJsonFromTwxRepository('/CADFiles/json_lists/compJSON_loc_Data.json') }   I tested all points of  the described techniques above in a  test project which I want to provide here as zip file for the HoloLens (hideComponetsHoloLens .zip):     So to be able to test it you need to create in Thingworx a repository thing - means a thing which uses  the thing template "FileRepositroy" with the name "CAD-Files-Repository" and create a folder there "/CADFiles/json_lists/" (if you use another name and another folder (e.g. "/" no folder - the root repository folder) you have to adapt the javaScript code:   ... /CADFiles/json_lists/compJSON_loc_Data.json ... app.mdl.CAD-Files-Repository.svc.SaveJSON' ... app.mdl.CAD-Files-Repository.svc.LoadJSON'    
View full tip
PDFs can be linked to experiences using a few methods. Below is an example of using the toggle widget or a toggle button to open and close a PDF within your experience.          Example of JavaScript code to add to Home.js file: $scope.toggleButton = function() { //if the toggle is pressed if ( $scope.view.wdg['toggleButton-1']['pressed']==true) { window.location='app/resources/Uploaded/%5BBD-Logbuch%5D20190208-20190310.pdf' console.log($scope.view.wdg['file-1']['url']) } //unpress the toggle button after 1,5 sec $timeout(function () { $scope.view.wdg['toggleButton-1']['pressed']=false;}, 1500); }      
View full tip
Your company might have a css that represents the corporate identity - or you may have other sources of reusable css styles that you want to include with minimal effort. Here is what you have to do to use corporate css files to drive the look and feel of your experiences: Add the corporate css file (e.g. company.css) to your resources In Application styles add the following at the beginning (before any other css style entry: @import url(#{$resources}/Uploaded/company.css);     With the following content in company.css: And this label definition:   Produces this outcome (you see it in the editor as well as in the preview):   Gotcha!    
View full tip
Using Connection Filters for state-based rendering and value formatting   State-based rendering of properties that come from user inputs or from connected ThingWorx data is a common requirement. Think about the following scenario: from ThingWorx you get the state of a as one of these values: [ OK | At-Risk | Issue ]. You would like to visualize it with a 3D image or a changed 3DGauge icon.   You can achieve that easily with a Vuforia Studio functionality that is often overseen: The Connection Filters. With connection filters you can achieve a lot of very nice a common features, mainly: number and date formatting value pre- and postfixing (specifically units for numbers but also anything else) state-based formatting, e.g. changing the image or style based on a number change   Here is what I mean in practice:   Step 1:   Step 2:   Here is the stateBasedStyling Connection Filter content:   return value < 3000 ?    "fill:rgba(255, 255, 255, 1);textbaseline:middle;textalign:center" :    "fill:rgba(255,   0,   0, 1);textbaseline:middle;textalign:center" ;   value is a key word and represents the value on the connection before applying the filter function. The returned value is the one that is used in the bound-to attribute. I found that the expression has to be a one-liner (technically), i.e. you have to start your expression with 'return' and can't do something like:   if(value < 3000) return "fill:rgba(255, 255, 255, 1);textbaseline:middle;textalign:center"; else return "fill:rgba(255,   0,   0, 1);textbaseline:middle;textalign:center";     Resulting Filter in ThingWorx Studio: You can add multiple filters but I didn't check yet in which sequence they'll be evaluated (top-to-bottom or bottom-to-top).     Examples of Usage   1. Show icons for Enum values: I used it often to display enumerated-type values (i.e. the input values are from a discrete value set e.g.named colors) with images/icons:   return "app/resources/Uploaded/colorImg_"+value+".png";   in combination with the corresponding uploaded images, in this case named colorImg_red.png, colorImg_blue.png, etc.   2. Format Numbers and postfix with unit The following formats the input number 12.769 to 12.8 mph.   return $filter('number')(value, 1) + " mph";     See the AngularJS documentation for the available filter types. Relevant are: currency number date   I haven't tested yet if these filters can also be applied to input arrays of objects that come from a service (e.g. for a repeater widget). If this is supported the array-based filters may be applicable/usable as well.  
View full tip