Re: EMC for linux_2_2_10

EMC Users,

Brian L. bravely installed EMC for Linux 2.2.10. I should hide these
better. He wrote:

> 1) Why are the ini files in the emc directory screwed up (they use linux_2_0_36 and rtlinux_09J instead of linux_2_2_10 and
> rtlinux_b11 respectively. Easy to fix, but took me about half an hour to figure out.)

I'll see about putting version-specific INI files in with each release.
I just have one set now and you have to hand-edit it to match your
version, as you discovered.

> 2) How do you go about using the tkemc interface? This is undocumented in the emc package and I would like to see it happen.

The TkEMC interface is "under development," which means, for example,
that I was adding logging over the weekend and it's still on a floppy
here in my pocket. The key bindings are still screwed up, but it's
almost to the point where it can replace xemc.

To use the tkemc GUI you simply replace "xemc" with "tkemc" for the
DISPLAY entry in the [DISPLAY] section. This assumes that "tkemc" is in
the plat/linux_2_whatever/bin directory, which it should be since the
Makefile in emc/src/emctask takes the tkemc.tcl script and copies it
out. Note that there is another script that is loaded, genedit.tcl,
which is located in the emc/src/emctask directory, and another one for
logging. These will be copied out into the bin directory once I release
this.

> 3) Is there any documentation detailing the requirements and for an EMC interface (the XEMC source code is not an optimal way
> to figure out how to author an interface)
> 4) Where can I find documentation on ALL of the APIs of EMC so I can write an interface?

We are missing two key pieces of documentation (at least): the User's
Guide, which will tell how to install, configure, and run the EMC; and
the Developer's Guide, which will tell you how to build your own GUI,
add support for new boards, change the servo algorithms, kinematics,
etc.

For the Developer's Guide, all we have at this point is the main C++
header file, in emc/src/emcnml/emc.hh. This lists all the messages the
EMC can take, and all the status it provides. The messages are in
Neutral Message Language (NML) format, which is a communication system
we developed to support NIST's needs for a portable communication system
that can use a variety of protocols (shared memory, backplane global
memory, networks).

In emc/src/emctask/xemc.cc, you'll see functions like sendMdi() that
compose NML messages and write them out. These are duplicated in the C
part of the Tcl/Tk GUI, emc/src/emctask/emcsh.cc.

> Also, is there any better documentation for EMC available? the docs in the package are not quite enough.

There is no better documentation right now. Your "not quite enough" is
very diplomatic. We're working on this and I hope to get those two
high-priority documents (User's and Developer's Guides) out soon.

--Fred