Experimental Physics and
Industrial Control System

"Giacomo S." <[email protected]> · Wed, 6 Sep 2017 10:02:32 +0200

Good morning Andrew! Wow, your support is great! Thanks a lot!

On 09/05/2017 06:58 PM, Andrew Johnson wrote:
> Hi Giacomo,
>
> On 09/05/2017 10:01 AM, Giacomo S. wrote:
>> So, summing up, suppose to recreate this scenario:
>>
>> - application starts
>> --> client requests monitoring of  pv1 = foo:ai1
>>
>> - (first request, so)   ca_context_create(ca_enable_preemptive_callback)
>>
>> - ca_create_channel (...)
>>
>> - (in  connection_handler invoked from EPICS foo thread: ) 
>> ca_create_subscription(...)
> A note: You are allowed to subscribe to channels using a different
> request data type than their native type, and the IOC will do its best
> to convert the data for you. I don't completely understand how your
> connection_handler() method transforms the native type, but I just
> wanted to make that point for later on...

Hmm actually just as a starting point, I took the code from camonitor,

ppv->dbfType = ca_field_type(ppv->ch_id);
ppv->dbrType = dbf_type_to_DBR_TIME(ppv->dbfType); /* Use native type */

where dbf_type_to_DBR_TIME is a macro so defined:

#define dbf_type_to_DBR_TIME(type)  \
    (((type) >= 0 && (type) <= dbf_text_dim-3) ? \
        (type) + 2*(dbf_text_dim-2)   :  -1  )

Of course at this early stage I don't understand it.

I've had a look in the source code but I got lost between what is called
new/old db/channel and so on...

// example where I got lost:

// #define dbChannelExportCAType(pChan)
(dbDBRnewToDBRold[dbChannelExportType(pChan)])

So, probably it's safe to remove dbf_type_to_DBR_TIME, but in that case
what's the difference between
dbR type and dbF type?

one more question follows below...

>> [ monitors for a while, receive event callbacks from EPICS foo thread]
>>
>> --> client requests pv2  = foo:ai2
>>
>>  - ca_create_channel (...)
>>
>> - (in  connection_handler invoked from EPICS foo thread: ) 
>> ca_create_subscription(...)
>>
>>
>> ---> network goes down
>>
>> - (in pv1 connection callback invoked from EPICS foo thread:)  1. 
>> ca_clear_subscription()   BUT NOT ca_clear_channel()
> Here's where Michael and I have slightly differing opinions: I wouldn't
> necessarily clear the subscription when the connection goes down,
> especially if I'm not relying on the native data type of the channel to
> select what type I subscribe with. CA will remember the original
> subscription and will reconnect it to the IOC when it comes back. In
> connection_handler() you were already storing the fact that you have
> already subscribed, so that code wouldn't create multiple subscriptions.
>
> One issue that you do have to be careful of though is if an IOC gets
> rebooted with a modified database so the data type of a channel you were
> subscribed to changes between the connection going down and coming back
> up. In this case CA subscriptions will reconnect using the type in their
> original subscription request, which might now be different to the
> native type of the channel. The client code has to be aware of that and
> use the type information from the data update callback.

If the data type on the IOC (server) has changed, shouldn't this change
reflect into the client?
I mean, if on the server (IOC) side a double type becomes an integer,
the client should change, right?

>
> Michael's approach of clearing subscriptions at disconnect is probably
> safer, but requires the application code to do a bit more work, as
> evidenced by the additional calls to ca_create_subscription() below. The
> difference is really a matter of opinion.
>
>> - (in pv2 connection callback invoked from EPICS foo thread:)  1. 
>> ca_clear_subscription()      BUT NOT   ca_clear_channel()
>>
>> ---> network UP again
>>
>>
>> - (in pv1 connection callback invoked from EPICS foo thread:)  1. 
>> ca_create_subscription() 
>>
>> - (in pv2 connection callback invoked from EPICS foo thread:)  1. 
>> ca_create_subscription()  
>>
>> ---> client requests pv3  = bar:ai3
>>
>>  - ca_create_channel (...)
>>
>> - (in  connection_handler invoked from EPICS >>> bar <<<  thread: ) 
>> ca_create_subscription(...)   <--- bar THREAD <----
>>
>> [ receive event callbacks from 2 threads: foo for pv1 and pv2,  bar for
>> pv3 ]
>>
>> ---> client wants to disconnect everything (or application shutdown)
>>
>> - foreach pv:                                                 // is this
>> safe to be called from the thread that initially called the ca_create* 
>> counterparts???
> You can call any ca routine from any thread that has been attached to
> the context, so yes.
>
>>   * ca_clear_subscription();
>>   * ca_clear_channel();
>>
>> - ca_context_destroy();                                // from same
>> thread where ca_context_create() was called
>>
>>
>> Is the above correct? Am I somewhere wrong?
> It looks like you understand it pretty well.
>
>
>> Some more simpler questions:
>>
>> 1. every time I receive an event, evargs contain not only the value /
>> timestamp but also configuration parameters, right (HI, LO thresholds
>> and so on...)
> Not sure what the question is there. Your event_handler_cb() routine is
> given a struct event_handler_args whose void *dbr pointer points to the
> dbr_* type that you subscribed to. There are many different dbr_* data
> types defined in db_access.h containing different subsets of the
> available data, but none of them provides everything, so you may need to
> subscribe to the same channel multiple times with different types and
> different event masks. Channel metadata (enum strings, alarm levels etc)
> usually change much less frequently than the data itself, and the event
> mask DBE_PROPERTY is designed to tell you when metadata has changed.

Ok, this is a good answer.
A typical graphical interface wants to put in evidence warning or alarm
values (for example, in a gauge you want yellow or red bands or you may
want coloured stripes on the background of a plot in the alarm or
warning sections), so, in this case I may be interested in two kind of
subscriptions:

- the DBE_PROPERTY to get alarms. LO/HI thresholds, display and so on...
- the DBE_VALUE to get value changes.

It would be very useful to me a kind of documentation where this is
described.
I'll have a look at your link now.

Thanks again

Giacomo

>
>> 2. are there utility functions to extract the value and timestamp from
>> the evargs and easily convert them into  the correct type (short,
>> double, int...)
> There are some macros in db_access.h that can help, e.g. dbr_value_ptr
>
> if you limit the number of types you subscribe to you can avoid having
> to write code that understands all the dbr_* types.
>
>> 3. If I monitor a PV, is it possible to know from the args if it's a
>> vector (and its dimension) or a scalar?
> Yes, the struct event_handler_args contains the data type, chid and
> element count for the data contained in this update (look in cadef.h for
> its definition). count==1 means it's a scalar.
>
>> 4. where can I find the explanation of this: Lo disp limit, hi disp
>> limit, Lo alarm limit.... ?
> Those metadata fields are supplied from fields of the record, disp =
> display, so a graph of the channel data over time should expect to use
> the low display limit for the bottom of the y axis and the high display
> limit for the top. Alarm limits tell you if the PV generates alarms what
> data values would trigger those alarms, so you could put a marker on the
> axis if you chose to do so.
>
>> 5. How to extract the timestamp of the event (as far as I've seen from
>> the code, there must be a timestamp from the server and one from the
>> client. In this case, what does the client side timestamp mean. Is it
>> the timestamp when the event is received on the client itself?)
> You appear to be looking at code from catools, which added the idea of
> providing a client-side timestamp as well as or instead of the timestamp
> from the IOC itself. I think it just provides the client's idea of the
> time when the CA library called its callback; this isn't part of the CA
> client library itself.
>
>> Is there a good tutorial for a quick start and the answers to my
>> questions 1 to 5?
>> I mean a quick start to understand how to program a client in C (C++).
> Maybe not at the level of detail you're asking, I think you've probably
> gone beyond what most CA client tutorials covered, but you could browse
> the EPICS Training links to see if there are any that help:
>     http://www.aps.anl.gov/epics/docs/training.php
>
>> One final thing: I've seen a set of C++ libraries (pvaClientCPP,
>> pvCommonCPP)  and in general the
>>
>> "EPICS V4 C++ module"
>>
>> but it looks like it's not up to date with the latest EPICS release.
>>
>> Is this the "official" C++ Epics module?
>>
>> Is it normal that it trails the last EPICS version?
> Those modules are part of the newer EPICS V4 network protocol
> implementation, which are designed to supplement and eventually replace
> the CA protocol. That's a completely different topic and the APIs are
> completely different, I suggest you ignore them for now.
>
> HTH,
>
> - Andrew
>

Experimental Physics and Industrial Control System

Experimental Physics and
Industrial Control System