General panel components

ASCII file

The file selector can be set to input or output an ASCII file. You can also enter a file directly in the text field. You can view and edit this file in the operating system editor by pressing the Editor button. You can also input and output the files as an Excel table (applies to Windows only).

Import/Export

The "Import/ Export" radio box is used to specify whether to import or export data.

Note: Note that the character limit of a single DPT/DP/DPE string value is 131201 characters.

ASCII options

In this part, there are 2 two additional information lines for the Import/Export via the ASCII Manager panel. The first line Database shows the WinCC OA database path in the current project. The second line Connection shows the host name and the port number at which the Data as well as the Event Manager of the current project run. The information lines are important particularly for redundant projects.

In a redundant project, the text field Connection shows the Data and Event manager of the active computer. If the redundant project is in the split mode, the button Switch is shown. Through this button the connection to the Data/Event manager is switched to one of the two redundant computers. When importing data on the test system (For detailed information on the split mode, see chapter Redundancy in split mode), it is necessary to select the right host name for the connection in the panel.

Note: The UI that started the ASCII panel must have a connection to both Event Managers in split mode (that means the start of the UI without the command line options "-data" and "-event") so that the data are imported respectively exported correctly when switching the host. If the UI has only one connection to the left respectively the right Event Manager, the data is imported only on the own system.
CAUTION: Changing the system to split mode, while the panel is open, is not recognized from the panel

Configuration

Select a saved configuration in the combo box and load it by clicking Add. You can also create and save panel settings with a specific name. Depending on what you select in "Import/Export", the program displays only output or only input configurations for selection. Click on the Delete button to remove the selected configuration.

Start

Start begins data input/output. Under Windows, the ASCII Manager launches a DOS box and under Linux a xterm console.

CAUTION: To start the export or import, you have to enter your password (exception: user ROOT).
Note: Note that the ASCII files (dp lists) must be saved without BOM (Byte Order Mark, Unicode character meaning 0xef 0xbb 0xbf)!

Under Linux, information is shown in the window in which the UI was started. The window remains open after the import.

CAUTION: Nothing is displayed in these windows when you output data.

Log file/ Info file

  • "Log file" opens a file (automatically after import) containing the default WinCC OA log output (for example, including any error messages).

  • "Info file" opens a file in which the ASCII Manager outputs various status and progress information.

Close/Help

The Close button closes the panel. The Help button opens the online panel documentation.