Anyone have four and/or five position multiple pole rotary switch custom controls to share?

[gone_fishin']

I need multi-layer wafer rotary switches. Specifically, four and/or five position rotary switches with multile poles (wafers). Anyone care to share their already-made custom controls? Or is there an on-line library of additional controls? Thanks

[Dennis_Knutson]

Here's a single pole. It's just a modified dial control. I don't think you can create a single control with multiple poles but yoy can certainly simulate one with multiple controls and local variables or property nodes.

[Al_S]

In the hardware world, a multi-pole rotary switch has one position for all poles: all poles are in position 1, or all poles are in position 2, etc. So in the software world, if you look at your inputs as a 1D array, the outputs could be a 2D array with the rotary switch position determining the column index for all outputs. You could choose to make the unconnected outputs (columns) a fixed value like 0 or NaN (not a number). If you use NaN for your unconnected outputs, any downstream function or VI looking at the outputs could easily test if the output was connected by using the Not a Number/Path/RefNum function from the Comparison palette. See the attached LabView 6.1 example (using Dennis's cool rotary switch).

[mikeporter]

You could also use Dennis' switch to control a case structure containing one value for each "wafer" and one case for each "pole".

Mike...

[Aitortxo]

Hi Dennis:
Could you, please, explain step-by-step how you got the modified Dial control to the Rotary Switch?. I am very interested in customizing controls, but all I get is importing pictures from file.

May be it is too much to make such a question. Could you recommend any book or something that can help me learn about customizing controls?

Thanks in advance,

Aitortxo.

[Dennis_Knutson]

For most of it, you don't even have to go into the control editor. From a dial on the front panel, I first set the representation to I32. Then I set the range by clicking on the last number and changing it to 3. With the Postion/size tool, if you move the cursor over the numbers, you'll see the cursor change to a sort of semi-circle. If you have either the first or last number selected, dragging the mouse will cause the scale to compress or expand. Selecting a number in the middle of the scale will cause the scale to rotate. I then colored the center of the dial transparent and the needle black. I then when into the control editor to make the needle longer. Move the curosr over the needle until you get a circle shaped curosr. When you do,
you can drag the size of the needle. I don't know of any books on customizing controls. There's probably some tutorials on NI Zone that you could do a search for. The other thing that you could do is just experiment. Edit a control and turn on the Parts Window. Drag the parts to different places and see what you can do to them.

[gone_fishin']

Thanks to Dennis et al for all the good info. Good explanation Dennis on how you built the switch. I'm surprised however, that there isn't some kind of library of custom switches/controls. I could also use some DPDT (Center Off) toggle switches. Seems to me there's a lot of wheel re-inventing going on.

[Aitortxo]

Thanks a lot, Dennis
Your answer has been very interesting. It opens me many doors.
Watching the scale rotating and compressing was so good. Thank you very very much.

Aitortxo.

[Al_S]

Yeah, I guess something like a SPDT toggle switch would come in handy. User familiarity with that type of switch in hardware could lead to a more intuitive interface if we had that as a control. Right now, I use rings or slides for stuff like SPDT switches.

[gone_fishin']

Thanks Al. I'm just surprised there isn't a common library of custom-made controls that can be recycled by users rather than re-invented.