PC Developer
Contents
About PC Developer
PC Developer allows you to easily create programs to control and monitor devices external to the PC. But it is much more than that. Flowcode PC Developer allows you to create general purpose programs with user interfaces that calculate, plot and display information. It can gather information for from your desk, from inside your building, in your town, and across the world over the internet.
Flowcode PC Developer uses the same programming interface as Flowcode Embedded. So if you know Flowcode you can now easily design Windows apps for your own use or for royalty free distribution to others.
One particular strength is that Flowcode PC Developer contains a large number of communication components that allow you to create distributed control, data gathering and analytical systems so it is particularly good at creating PC Developer like systems using Application Programming Interfaces (API). Support for popular USB, Bluetooth, and Web based hardware platforms like Modbus PLCs, Arduino, Raspberry Pi, Ethernet and other systems are provided.
Developing apps with PC Developer
PC Developer can be used to create a wide variety of types of applications, a small selection of which can be found in the PC Developer Example Projects section of the wiki. Typically these projects will communicate with external hardware, possibly developed using Flowcode Embedded, and there are many components that can be used to make this easier.
The PC Developer Getting Started Guide explains the fundamentals of using Flowcode PC Developer to create apps.
Examples of PC Developer applications
PC Developer is a programming language that can be used for many applications. It is particularly useful for creating control, data gathering and analysis systems: local and remote.
Desk based
An electronic circuit board under test is placed in a jig which connects it to a power source, a MIAC with a Flowcode Embedded program, an Arduino Uno with a Flowcode Embedded program and a TTI signal generator.
The Flowcode App running on the PC communicates with dedicated embedded test programs in the MIAC and UNO, coordinating and collecting the results of the tests performed on the device. Results are logged to a local file on the hard drive.
Building based
An array of sensors monitor the environmental conditions within a greenhouse and display the status via the internet on a mobile phone.
Depending on these inputs, the application controls devices within the greenhouse such as heating/lighting and moisture levels to maintain optimum growing conditions for the plants.
The system consists of three MIAC controllers linked by CAN bus with one linking to the PC using USB. The MIAC controllers are programmed with Flowcode Embedded.
World based
The PC application monitors building entry access and controls the environment.
It uses keypads and/or locks with RFID tag readers built in, and grants or refuse access to certain doors and areas depending on the code given. It also monitors temperature and controls lights.
A record of visitor and employee movements is recorded and can be displayed on web based devices to determine where they currently are in case of an emergency (e.g. evacuation due to a fire).
Flowcode Embedded is used for developing the software for MIAC controller and the Raspberry pi custom IO and Broker. The Broker effectively acts as a web connected portal through which all data is stored and flows.
Find out more about PC Developer using the links below.
Links
PC Developer Getting Started Guide
PC Developer Example Projects
Deploying PC Developer apps
Running .mscada deployed PC Developer files
Low-level APIs for controlling embedded devices
Web Developer
Web Developer Getting Started Guide
Worked Examples
