Frequently Asked Questions

Configuration

1. Why does the screen display sometimes pause for a brief period? The most common cause is that the operating system is displaying a menu or tooltip and has paused all screen updates while performing a "Transition Effect".  You can disable "Transition Effect"s in the Windows Control Panel / Display / Appearance / Effects... / Use transition effects.  This will cure this cause of the problem.
2. Why does my control not set the value of the channel it is connected to? The most common reason is that it is setting the value of something else with the same name.  For example if your control has the same name as your channel, the control will connect to itself since it is more local to itself than to the channel.  You can prefix the channels by their collection names to avoid this problem.  E.g. "MyChannels.MyChannel".
3. What is the difference between a Channel and Variable types?
   The Channel classes are simple classes suitable for use as base classes for all other channels.  The Variable classes are based on the Channel classes and have extra functionality, mainly the ability to save and restore their values in configuration files.
4. How do you set a Constant channel?
   Constant channels are constant and cannot be set.  Their value is defined when they are created.  If they are created from a KineticaRT Studio channel file then the value is obtained from the channel file and can only be modified by editing the channel file, “.ksc”, before the constant is created.  Currently there is no editor available although it is possible to use notepad or Visual Studio.
5. Can I undo property changes in the Frame Editor?
   Unfortunately any property changes made from the property editor cannot be undone.  Microsoft Visual Studio has the same problem. 
6. Why can't I drop channels onto my control?
   You can drop channels from the Explorer window and from the channel list but only when not in edit mode at the moment.
   You may need to enable drag and drop, “AllowDrop= True”,on the display control, some controls have it disabled by default.
7. Drop Always seems to set source, is there any way to drop onto destination?
   This is dependent on the component.  The KineticaRT.Studio button sets both source and destination.
8. What is the difference between Source and SourceChannel?
   The Source property should be set to the name of a channel (a string) and the control will do a search for the channel. 
   The SourceChannel property should be set to a reference to a channel object.  This is not normally used within KineticaRT Studio.  
9. Can you use third party controls within KineticaRT Studio
   Yes as long as they are .Net compatible. 
   Note: There is limited support for designers within KineticaRT Studio so not all controls will be fully usable without some form of wrapper.  You are likely to want some form of wrapper anyway so that your customers can just drop them on the screen and have them connected and working without having to add code.  Visual Studio can be used to write the wrappers.
   Note: ActiveX controls can normally be used as well but a simple Visual Studio wrapper will almost certainly be required.  Use .Net versions if there is a choice.
10. Cannot edit sequences with Notepad.
    Sometimes sequences have been edited with an editor that doesn’t include linefeed characters.  If you put them back in then notepad can be used. 

Licensing

1. Does KineticaRT Studio include KineticaRT Components?
   A KineticaRT Studio license will allow use of all KineticaRT components used by KineticaRT Studio components.  E.g. the KineticaRT dial is used by the KineticaRT Studio dial component and is included in a KineticaRT Studio license.

Notes

1. If you have a slow onboard graphics card then edit mode can be very slow.  We use Matrox G550 dual head (monitor) graphics cards, often with one KineticaRT Studio window on each monitor; these graphics cards are reasonably cheap and worth having.
2. The .Net Framework must be installed in order to run the KineticaRT Studio.  This can be obtained from Microsoft via Windows Update or from the KineticaRT web site.  No other software is required. No installation is required.
3. KineticaRT Studio is not designed to compete with tools such as Visual Studio.  It is designed to work with them during development while allowing end users to configure their systems without needing or understanding such tools.  During development some things are best done in Visual Studio, others are best done in KineticaRT Studio.  In a simple system Visual Studio is not required.