Experimental Physics and
Industrial Control System

Ken Evans <[email protected]> · Thu, 27 Aug 1998 16:03:54 -0500

     MEDM 2.3.4 is now available.  This version has been in use for
operations at the Advanced Photon Source for over a month with 1
reported minor problem, which has been fixed in this release, MEDM
2.3.4a.  This version is primarily a bug fix release, but there are a
few new features.

    It should be noted that the version of MEDM released by BESSY as
2.4.10 is a related but different program.

Version 2.3.4
=============

1. The default startup option is -local. There is a new option,
-attach, to either attach to an existing MEDM if there is an eligible
one, or to make the current one eligible for attachment if there is
not. You need to use -attach to achieve the former default startup
behavior. This behavior is primarily applicable for a control room,
where it is typically set in scripts.  It was confusing and not
appropriate for individual users.  Note that scripts that start MEDM
may have to be changed when version 2.3.4 is used if the attach
feature is desired.

2. The Meter, Bar Monitor, and Scale Monitor have been fixed to be the
size specified. Formerly, they were two pixels wider, this space being
used for the border. There is now no border, and the top and bottom
shadows are the same as for Motif widgets, rather than being drawn
with another, simplified algorithm. The Bar Monitor appears raised.
It is not expected these changes for consistency will significantly
affect most display screens.

3. The Bar Monitor has a no-decorations option. This allows making bar
graphs.

4. Screens should be positioned correctly (according to the x and y
for the display), and they should not jump when they are resized,
replaced, or when you go from EDIT<->EXECUTE mode.  Placing screens is
up to the Window Manager, so this still may not work on all systems.

5. There is no longer a "Current" button on the resource palette.  It
was intended for features that were never implemented.  Removing it
makes more options visible without scrolling.

6. The Strip Chart now retains its values after a paste as it should.

7. There should no longer be a "Bad Window" error if MEDM cannot find
the aliased fonts.

8. The Related Display now writes the labels properly to the ADL file,
so there is no problem with labels with spaces in them.

9. For the Related Display, if a label starts with "-", the double
rectangles will not appear.  You no longer have to make Composite,
Hidden buttons to achieve this functionality.

10. The Text Update should no longer write outside its boundaries.

     See the reference manual for a more detailed description.  It is
available in HTML and Postscript at:

http://www.aps.anl.gov/asd/controls/epics/EpicsDocumentation/WWWPages/EpicsDoc.html

     Statically-linked versions that have been authorized for
XRT/graph are available.  Check Bakul's recent announcement titled
"New on EPICS Software Distribution" for more information.

     There is a beta testing group for MEDM.  If you are interested in
having the latest version, can build MEDM (or extract the Solaris
version from the TAR file), and are willing to help test, let me know
([email protected]), and I will put you on the distribution list.  The
most recent version has a replacement for XRT/Graph and (almost)
supports CDEV, features to which Jie Chen of TJNAF contributed
significantly.  Questions about the CDEV support should be related to
Jie ([email protected]).

     -Ken

Experimental Physics and Industrial Control System

Experimental Physics and
Industrial Control System