Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On!

With appologies to Jerry Lee Lewis and his famous song, Dang we’ve been busy here at the Cookbook!

As a result, I haven’t posted anything to the blog in way too long. I’ll make this post a roundup of the news of what we’ve been doing and try to post more frequently going forward. As many of you will know, sometimes you just get sucked in and have to swim with the current.

CNC G-Code Tutorial

We continue to add chapters to our G-Code Tutorial series. Since I last posted about it, we’ve added the following chapters:

- Linear Motion With G00 and G01: Just finished that one this morning. Includes a discussion of how line motion works in g-code as well as how the G-Wizard feeds and speeds calculator can be accessed right in G-Wizard Editor in the feeds and speeds Wizard.

Feeds and speeds calculator integrated into the Feeds and Speeds Wizard…

- Parameterized Programming: A quick tutorial on how to use # parameters and expressions in g-code programs.

- Subprograms and Macros: A building blocks approach to g-code programming.

- Conditions and Looping: IF, WHILE, and GOTO for g-code programming.

I’m particularly proud of the last 3 chapters because they provide a mini-tutorial of Fanuc Macro B programming which is the foundation for more productivity when hand programming g-code. There’s still a lot of chapters to finish the series, including the detailed example I’m still working through to create a serial number engraving macro.

G-Wizard Calculator Updates

On the software front, there’s been a flurry of releases which I will summarize. For Calculator, we released 1.545, which includes:

- There’s a new Cut Depth Mini-Calculator for turning. To recommend a Cut Depth, it looks at the type and size of insert you’re using, as well as whether you’re roughing or finishing, and the lead angle you’re presenting the insert to the cut with:

Cut Depth calculator for Turning…

- The HSM calculator is slightly changed. It no longer messes with SFM or Chipload–these are left as they were without HSM compensation. Instead, correction factors are applied to RPM and Feedrate. The amount of the multiplier for each is also now displayed in the calculator. This makes it easier to enter custom SFM and Chipload based on manufacturer’s tooling recommendations and then apply the HSM multiplier downstream. Thanks to William for the suggestion!

- If you select a particular Alloy and Condition from the Materials DB, your selection will now be displayed below the Materials drop down.

- You can run G-Wizard for up to 2 weeks without an Internet connection. What’s new in 1.540 is it will start to warn you 3 days in advance of when the 2 weeks runs out. This was based on feedback from customers who didn’t want last minute hiccups with G-Wizard not running when they got in on a Monday. 3 days will let you know Friday to take care of it over the weekend if need be.

- The number of decimal places on feedrate is reduced when in metric–there were too many and it made it hard to read sometimes.

- We added a “Made by CNCCookbook in America” notice because we’re proud of our roots.

G-Wizard Editor Updates

For the Editor, we made a flurry of releases culminating in G-Wizard Editor Version 0.300. A summary of all the changes is here:

- Performance on the Backplot has been a big focus for this series of releases and we’ve really cranked it up. All told the backplot is about 10x faster on large files than it was 2 weeks ago. There’s still a lot more performance enhancements to come since we haven’t gotten the new Flash Player 11 with hardware graphics card acceleration yet, but even without we’re finally getting into the performance neighborhood we should be in, though we’re still far from finished with performance. The biggest UI changes related to this performance work include:

- There is a new set of Refresh options on the Backplot Options menu. These control how often a background update to hints (error messages) and the backplot is done. “Auto-Refresh” is the old default. What’s new is a file size entry that will turn off “Auto-Refresh” on files larger than the specified size. The default threshold is 256 K bytes.

- When Auto-Refresh is off, refreshing the backplot and hints is deferred until the g-code type-in pane loses focus (due to a popup or switching to another view), or until the user has stopped doing anything in that pane for a time (1.5 seconds is the current setting).

- Once a non-auto refresh starts, it tends to go much faster (up to 2x as fast), but the system will be less responsive until it finishes that auto-refresh.

- When you load a file, a popup will appear for larger files that says “Hang on, processing a big file.” While that popup is visible, the system is totally focused on getting through the refresh as fast as possible (again, up to 2x faster than prior releases). If you press “Cancel”, it will pause where it is and wait for the next opportunity to refresh (i.e. during another popup or if you initiate the refresh).

- You can tell if you are in manual- or auto-refresh via a message on the status bar at the bottom.

- If in manual, and you want the system to refresh, either press F9 (same as “recalc” in Excel), click the replot icon on the Tool Bar, or select “Backplot Refresh” from the menus.

- The other major focus has been on editing commands, especially the Revisions, which process big blocks of g-code to change them in some way. Here’s what we did with Revisions:

- The Adjust Addresses revision can now be used to change the formatting of numbers to match the post.

- Two buttons on the Adjust Address revision allow switching to and from lathe diameter or radius mode.

- There is a new Arc Adjust revision that can change IJK center to R format and vice versa, and it can change IJK from relative to absolute and vice versa.

- There is a new Feeds and Speeds override that can be used to adjust feeds and speeds either for all tools or for a particular tool number.

- Some of the revisions require the backplot to be up to date so they can use it’s information. They will pop up a message saying the backplot needs to be up to date if it isn’t. Just close the popups and wait for the backplot to finish updating.

- There is a new revision that can convert coordinates back and forth between relative and absolute.

The GWE G-Code Revision Tool…

- Did some fit and finish work on the Hints to make them more readable.

- Fixed a bug that was causing m-codes to never show any hints.

- There is a new option to Edit in CAPS except in comments. By default it is turned on, but may be turned off under Tools Options.

- There is a new full width cursor when running the simulator to make it easier to see exactly where you are in the g-code.

- Fixed some issues with the Line Number gutter getting out of sync with the lines.

- Fixed some bugs in Haas-style M97/M99.

- Did some slight rearranging of the toolbar to make room for some features coming in future releases.

- New “Jump to closest endpoint in backplot” feature. Click the new icon on the toolbar (magnifier with a “Play” arrow) to turn it on. Now when you click the mouse on the backplot, it moves the g-code cursor to the next line that refers to the nearest endpoint to where you clicked.

- A preferred file extension for use when saving files without extensions may be selected under the Tools Options menu.

- Turned on release feathering. Before, every GWE release was mandatory. Now, by default, some are mandatory, and some are notified over the course of 7 days.

Phew!

That’s a lot of new capabilities, performance, and polish. We’re still not done–this is release 0.300 and a shipping version will be 1.000. But the editor does a lot of useful things including many things no other g-code editing and simulating software will do. If you haven’t signed up for the Beta test, it’s free and I think you’ll enjoy trying out the editor.

Related posts:

1. New Home Page and Screen Shots for G-Wizard G-Code Editor
2. Adding Infinite Loop Detection and Macro Stepping to G-Wizard CNC Editor
3. Added Coordinate System and G-Code Dialect / Post Processor Articles to CNCCookbook’s Online G-Code Learning Course