Controlling message points, Developing remote monitor and control applications, Developing remote monitor – Echelon LNS User Manual

Page 241: And control applications

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LNS Programmer's Guide

227

Private Sub lcaObjectServer_OnMsgMonitorPointUpdateEvent( _

ByVal msgMonitorPoint As Object, _

UpdateType As Integer, _ByVal inputDataPoint As Object, _

ByVal outputDataPoint as Object, _

ByVal srcAddress As Object)

If msgMonitorPoint.Name = sensorMsgMonPoint _

AND UpdateType = lcaMonitorEventTypeMsgRequest Then

outputDataPoint.Value

=

myResponseData

End

If

End Sub

Controlling Message Points

You can send application messages to a device using MsgMonitorPoint objects. To

obtain a MsgMonitorPoint to use to send a single application message to a device, call

the

AppDevice

object's

GetMessagePoint()

method. This returns a

MsgMonitorPoint

object that you can use to send application messages to the device.

You can do so by writing to the

MsgMonitorPoint

object's

OutputDataPoint

or

RequestDataPoint

properties.

You can use the

OutputDataPoint

property to send a message that does not require a

response to the device. To send an application message to a device using this property,
set the

DataPoint

object's

Value

property to the value that you want to pass to the

device. All

DataPoint

objects returned by the

OutputDataPoint

property have their

AutoWrite

property set to

True

, so the data will be automatically written to the device.

You can use the

RequestDataPoint

property to send a message that requires a

response to a device. The response can be requested as a synchronous response, or as an
asynchronous

OnMsgMonitorPointUpdateEvent

event that is triggered when the

response is received. To send the request message, set the

DataPoint

object's

Value

property to the desired value. To request a synchronous response, call the

MsgMonitorPoint

object's

SendMsgWait()

method. In this case, the response will be

returned by this method as a

DataPoint

object. To request an asynchronous response,

call the

DataPoint

object's

Write()

method. The response message will be returned via

the

OnMsgMonitorPointUpdateEvent

event.

As of LNS Turbo Edition you may send an application message to multiple devices using

group or broadcast addressing. To do this you must first define a dynamic message tag on
the AppDevice object that represents your application’s Network Service Device. Once

you have done so, connect this message tag to input message tags on all destination

devices. Then, create a permanent message monitor point on the Network Service Device

that specifies the new dynamic message tag as the monitor target. These tasks are
described in the Adding Message Monitor Points to a Monitor Set section earlier in this

chapter. Once you have performed them, you can then open the monitor set, and use the
message monitor point to send application messages from the Network Service Device to

the devices that are connected to the dynamic message tag.

Developing Remote Monitor and Control Applications

Monitor and control applications often need to run on a different PC than the PC running

the LNS Server, and sometimes need to be able to function when the LNS Server is not

attached to the network, or becomes unavailable due to a loss of power or other failure.
To support this, LNS allows Independent client applications to open networks in server-

independent mode. Independent client applications do not require the LNS Server to be

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