Km9394,
I'm not sure if I understand your question completely. However, I will try and answer my best and if this does not answer your question, please respond with a clearly defined question.
First, I could not find a file names customstrings.txt. There are some files that are used for language translation purposes, but from your post it doesn't look like you want to use these either. They don't allow you to dynamically change any strings.
If you have string data that is stored in your TestStand sequence and you want to somehow display this information in your TestStand Operator Interface, probably the best solution would be to use UI Messages. UI Messages allow you to send information from your TestStand sequence through the TestStand Engine to your Operator Interface. Then when the information is in the Operator Interface, you can change values of your Operator Interface program.
Using UI Messages is broken down into 2 steps, posting the UI Message and receiving the UI Message. To post a UI Message from your TestStand sequence, simply use the ActiveX adapter to call the TestStand API method PostUIMessage (or PostUIMessageEx if you are using TestStand 3.0). You identify the message you are posting with a unique number above 10000 as one of the method's parameters. You can also pass string, numeric, or ActiveX data with the UI Message. This method will pass the data to the TestStand Engine.
Once the TestStand Engine receives the UI Message, it will send the UI Message to either the TestStand Sequence Editor or to the TestStand Operator Interface, depending on what application is currently being used to run the sequence. If the sequence editor is used, custom UI Messages are discarded.
If in the Operator Interface, there is a section of the code that explicitly handles these UI Messages. Depending on what version of TestStand you are using and what programming environment you are using, this is handled differently. On a high level, all of the different operator interfaces handle UI Messages by receiving and sorting UI Messages by the UIMessageCode (the number that identifies what kind of UI Message was sent). Then based upon that number, the program determines what to do. This is usually implemented using a case or switch statement.
In your case, whenever you receive this custom UI Message, you can retrieve the string data and write that string value to your Operator Interface value you wish to change.
If this concept of using UI Messages does not seem to be a plausible solution, please respond including a more detailed problem description.
Regards,
Shannon R.
National Instruments
