Deltic_Malc Posted August 20, 2013 Share Posted August 20, 2013 Hi, Has anyone used the scheduling / timetable facility yet? My experience is fine I can get a number of programs to run with announcements, visuals (on screen) and set the clock to suit the times of the messages all excellent, but as this is a forum, here's the moan, which hopefully you can help me with. Once the schedule is set and been "ticked" I cannot view it without the schedule stopping. Also I cannot see how to print it and use a hard copy, other than a screen dump! Any idea's or help appreciated. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RDS Posted August 22, 2013 Share Posted August 22, 2013 Hi I can't help you but I am responding to your post just to bring it back up the top. It is unusual for you not to have had a response from the experts on here. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deltic_Malc Posted August 26, 2013 Author Share Posted August 26, 2013 Thanks RDS, Ok then as no one can offer any advice, has anyone used the schedule / time table feature ? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AlfK Posted August 28, 2013 Share Posted August 28, 2013 I too am interested in using the timetable/scheduling option in RM, but the manual has nothing about how to setup this feature, so help needed please. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RDS Posted August 28, 2013 Share Posted August 28, 2013 @AlfK It is covered briefly in the Chapter called 'Clock & Programs Timer' which is on page 65 of instructions version 1.50. (I am aware that there are later versions but this is the last version I printed) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Graskie Posted August 28, 2013 Share Posted August 28, 2013 Covered by pages 65 and 66 in version 1.51 Instructions. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AlfK Posted August 29, 2013 Share Posted August 29, 2013 Graskie said: Covered by pages 65 and 66 in version 1.51 Instructions. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AlfK Posted August 29, 2013 Share Posted August 29, 2013 Read pages 65 - 66..........setup a program to run at certain time (one that I know works). Time passes on clock but loco doesn't move? Looking in Log.txt file which shows the scheduled program runs, so anyone any ideas why the program doesn't run when the log says RM thinks it is running it? Alf Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deltic_Malc Posted August 31, 2013 Author Share Posted August 31, 2013 AlfK said: Read pages 65 - 66..........setup a program to run at certain time (one that I know works). Time passes on clock but loco doesn't move? Looking in Log.txt file which shows the scheduled program runs, so anyone any ideas why the program doesn't run when the log says RM thinks it is running it? Alf Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deltic_Malc Posted August 31, 2013 Author Share Posted August 31, 2013 I have used the timetable quite successfully, but only if I leave the computer alone and do nothing else, as I said when i started the thread,The time table stops if I try and view it and you cannot print it out. I have had upto six lines on the time table and usually start with a little program that sets the the clock, in my case to 6pm, that way I always know where the timetable will be. The time table gets confusing if I'm trying to tying it to the actual clock and I got fed up of waiting. So if you are doing other things on the computer you may miss the start time of the first line of the time table and then the time table is ignored. I started this thread a while ago and its interesting there doesn't seem to be any comments or advice from the Hornby experts, Maybe they thought it would work down the list and be forgotten, thanks for keeping it alive and good luck. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RDS Posted August 31, 2013 Share Posted August 31, 2013 @Deltic_Malc I am pretty sure that the experts did not think that your post would work it's way down the list and be forgotten. I guess that maybe not many people have used, or tried to use the feature. I have tried but without any success at all and the time set has always just passed without anything happening, which may now be due to the reason you have suggested. Thanks - I think I have learnt something from your experience! The one thing that always puzzles me is what are the boxes, numbered 1 to 8 for just to the left of the clock? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alan10 Posted August 31, 2013 Share Posted August 31, 2013 RDS said The one thing that always puzzles me is what are the boxes, numbered 1 to 8 for just to the left of the clock? RailMaster acts as an eight port server to external devices, (hand helds. Double click on one of the boxes and a window pops up showing the state of the server and the messages between the hand held and RailMaster. Very useful if you can't get your iPad to 'talk' to RailMaster. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
idlemarvel Posted August 31, 2013 Share Posted August 31, 2013 I'll have a play with the timetable feature today and see if I can help. Ref Deltic_malc, the boxes to the left of the clock are for handheld users, the numbers light up if you have a handheld using that port connected to your Railmaseter. You can ignore them if you don't use handheld devices. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
idlemarvel Posted August 31, 2013 Share Posted August 31, 2013 My findings after playing with schedule / timetable feature. Basically the timetable feature just runs programs at specified times. You can see the program steps running in the top left of the screen just as if you have launched the program manually. @Deltic_malc If you want to print out the schedule there is no way in the app to do it (other than screen print) but if you look in the /railmaster directory there is a file called schedule.dat which is just plain text file in the format: hh:mm~Y~name.prg Where hh:mm is the time, Y (or N) is used to indicate if that program is enabled / ticked (or not) and name.prg is the name of the program to run at that time. For example 12:05~Y~test.prg runs test.prg at 12:05 So you could just print this file. I have not tried editing this file outside of RM so be it on your own head if you do and it doesn't work any more! @AlfK I noticed that once the timetable has run, if you reset the clock to a time before, the timetable does not run again. You have to open the schedule / timetable, even if just to view it, then close it again, before the timetable runs again. Whether this is deliberate or not I couldn't say but the workaround is easy. Finally, I noticed that if you do anything else in the app, the timetable stops running, so you have to leave RM alone while it's running. Whether you could use your Elite controls at the same time I don't know. Hope this helps. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AlfK Posted August 31, 2013 Share Posted August 31, 2013 I seem to have stirred up some interest in using the scheduler in RM, unfortunately I have gone over and over trying to get a simple PRG file that I know works manually to run through the timer/scheduler. As no one seemed to be jumping in (until now) with some help/advice I fired off a support request. RM support did not read what I initially said and replied with a question asking me if the program I was trying to start via the scheduler actually referred to a correct event (PRG) using a loco assigned in the roster - which is why my first report to them specifically stated that the program worked manually!!?? Oh well, that hiccup over, have now sent them some files for them to replicate what I am trying to do ........hopefully more to follow. Alf Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RDS Posted August 31, 2013 Share Posted August 31, 2013 @alan10 and @idlemarvel Thanks to you both for your explanation of the numbered boxes. I don't use a handheld so that is probably why they never seemed to do anything! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deltic_Malc Posted September 1, 2013 Author Share Posted September 1, 2013 idlemarvel said: My findings after playing with schedule / timetable feature. Basically the timetable feature just runs programs at specified times. You can see the program steps running in the top left of the screen just as if you have launched the program manually. @Deltic_Malc If you want to print out the schedule there is no way in the app to do it (other than screen print) but if you look in the /railmaster directory there is a file called schedule.dat which is just plain text file in the format: hh:mm~Y~name.prg Where hh:mm is the time, Y (or N) is used to indicate if that program is enabled / ticked (or not) and name.prg is the name of the program to run at that time. For example 12:05~Y~test.prg runs test.prg at 12:05 So you could just print this file. I have not tried editing this file outside of RM so be it on your own head if you do and it doesn't work any more! @AlfK I noticed that once the timetable has run, if you reset the clock to a time before, the timetable does not run again. You have to open the schedule / timetable, even if just to view it, then close it again, before the timetable runs again. Whether this is deliberate or not I couldn't say but the workaround is easy. Finally, I noticed that if you do anything else in the app, the timetable stops running, so you have to leave RM alone while it's running. Whether you could use your Elite controls at the same time I don't know. Hope this helps. Thanks for having a look at this, we seen to have come to the same conclusions and ended up with the same questions. It's a long winded way of printing and stopping the timetable to view seems silly to me, hopefully they are oversights and will get sorted out! Regards Deltic_Malc Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RDS Posted September 5, 2013 Share Posted September 5, 2013 I wonder if HornbyRailMasterSupport would be good enough to advise what can / cannot be done on your computer etc when a timetable schedule has been set up to run, without halting the program. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
St1ngr4y Posted October 28, 2013 Share Posted October 28, 2013 AlfK said: Read pages 65 - 66..........setup a program to run at certain time (one that I know works). Time passes on clock but loco doesn't move? Looking in Log.txt file which shows the scheduled program runs, so anyone any ideas why the program doesn't run when the log says RM thinks it is running it? Alf I have been experimenting in the area of RM's clock / timers w.r.t. problems I have been having with the accelerate/decelerate commands. As part of this I noticed that the RM clock which is displayed in the bottom right corner of the main window, seems to run slower than the main PC clock (displayed by most Windows flavours at the right hand end of the Taskbar). The RM clock seems to lose about 1 second per minute over the PC clock. So if you schedule a program to run at, say, 12:30, it will start when the RM clock says 12:30:00, but if you look in the log.txt file, it will have recorded the timed program as having started at, for example, 12:30:15 (this being the pc time), depending on how long your RM session has been running. Would someone please confirm my findings, as I have had several replies from RM support giving the stock answer "It's your pc or software running in the background". Ray Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HornbyRailMasterSupport Posted October 28, 2013 Share Posted October 28, 2013 The RailMaster clock is based on the system clock. It takes the number of ticks from the computer's built-in clock. In some circumstances one or more 'ticks' can be missed thus slowing the clock down very slightly. Normally this is negligible, however, depending on other software being run on the PC (particularly permanently running applications) a larger effect can be seen, such as the one second per minute noticed, although this should be rare. There are many things that can cause the system clock not to report all of its 'ticks' to RailMaster, however a new timer facility has been built in to the next version of RailMaster (1.54) which resolves this. Version 1.54 will be released for automatic update shortly and will address several other minor issues. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RDS Posted October 28, 2013 Share Posted October 28, 2013 @HornbyRailMasterSupport I realise that your reference to ticks in your posting above are not the same 'ticks' that can be selected in the right hand column of the timed programs list but in order to be able to keep items in the list, rather than deleting them, I have removed the ticks. However, I have now noticed that the programs still run at the specified times even with the ticks removed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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