ViewDef Tools

This VSCode extension enables functionality to manipulate ViewDef files for Mercury projects. It is focused on the tasks that project execution engineers with those files, which mostly consist on copying the ViewDefs from the WcsStandard or the technology solution into WcsApplication.

Features

This extension provides the following features:

• Copy a ViewDef from any solution into WcsApplication, to let you change the original functionality.
• Copy a ViewDef from any solution into any solution (if the extended commands are active in the settings).
• Compare a duplicated ViewDef to its original, to check what are the project-specific changes for WcsApplication.
• Create the files for new Workplace Tasks (e.g. Dashboard, Main Navigation and Line Navigation) based on a currently existing workplace.

Copying a ViewDef

A ViewDef can be copied by right-clicking it in the file explorer and selecting Copy to Application solution. You will be prompted for the name of the new ViewDef. You can give it a new name, or leave the original name, to "replace" the original ViewDef completely:

Doing this, you still have to be sure that you are copying the right ViewDef, that is, you should locate the ViewDef that you want to copy in its appropriate solution: WcsStandard, WcsMilling, etc.

Copying a ViewDef directly by its ID

Another option is to execute the command ViewDef: Copy to Application solution directly from the Command Palette (using the shortcut Ctrl + Shift + P). The extension will prompt you for the ID (name) of the ViewDef that you want to copy, and then ask for the new name:

When copying by the ViewDef ID, the extension finds automatically from which solution the file should be copied, taking the compilation order into account. That means that ViewDefs in WcsApplication have priority over technology (e.g. WcsMilling), which are followed by WcsStandard.

Copying to any solution

If the option Extended Commands Enabled is active (see Settings), it is also possible to select to which solution the ViewDef will be copied to. The list of solutions is evaluated from the build configuration file.

Comparison of a ViewDef copy to its source

For ViewDefs created with the duplicate function, it is possible to compare it with the ViewDef it was copied originally from, in order to see what it changes from the built-in Mercury view:

If a ViewDef has not been copied with this extension, but still has the same name as the original one - for example, SingleJobViewDef inside WcsApplication, the extension also manages to find the original ViewDef.

Workplace Task duplication

Allows the user to copy the files related to a workplace task, assigning the name of a new worplace task to all files at once.

This command is only available for ViewDef fils inside the Wcs*Application folders, which contain the workplace task name suffix in the file name, for example, _MainOperating, _Intake, _MyWorkplace etc.

Settings

This extension exposes the following settings in the section Extensions > ViewDef Tools:

• Extended Commands Enabled: Displays additional commands that are not used by customer projects.

Notes on usage

• This extension requires the existence of the build configuration file at ProjectScripts/Wcs/build-all.config for the execution of some operations that rely on the configured build order.
• The application solution is considered to be the last solution of the build configuration file which contain Application in its name.