Capture & Playback

Tools

Capture & Playback

The Capture & Playback environment enables you to record (Capture) all the actions executed during an application working session into a log file and then execute them all again (Playback).

The following document describes general concepts about the Capture & Playback functionality:

The Capture & Playback interface
Suggestions on how to use the Capture & Playback functionality

Additional information about recording and playing back sessions can be found in the following documents:

Log files compatibility
Due to changes within the program, the accuracy of the Playback of log files recorded using a previous versions of the application can not be ensured.

Overview of the Capture & Playback interface

When you start the Capture & Playback command, the Capture & Playback dialog box is displayed. Initially, the Playback buttons are unavailable (since you have not yet recorded a log file).

When you select the Record button to begin recording a work session, the program displays a file dialog box for saving the log file. To play back an existing log file, click the Open button to select the desired log file.

The Capture & Playback dialog box provides the following functions:

	Record	Starts a Capture session. The program displays a file dialog box in which you specify the location to save the new log file. Once you've specified the log file name, all the actions you perform are recorded to the log file, until you select the Stop command. (For more details click here)
	Append Record	Starts a Capture session in append mode. All the actions you perform are appended to the selected log file, until you select the Stop command. (For more details click here) Before starting the recording session, an automatic Playback of the current log file is performed, so that the recording session starts at the end of the current log file.
	Playback	Plays back the current log file or the list of log files (the Play list having the file extension ".lst") until the end of the log file. If the Show trace option is active (read C&P - Options and Tools), a trace of the log file is printed to the I/O window, displaying each line being executed preceded by its own number, but the Playback session will be longer when this option is selected (for more details click here).
	Open	Displays a file dialog box enabling you to select a log file for Playback.
	Stop	Stops the current record/playback session.
	Debug	Expand the Capture & Playback dialog box to enable you to play back the current log file in step-by-step mode, using either context tags or log file line numbers. Read Debug mode for additional information about these options.
	Options and Tools	Displays the CP - Options and Tools dialog box, in which you can set the options which control the way the Capture & Playback functionality is performed. Read CP - Options and Tools for additional information about these functions.

Suggestions on how to use the Capture & Playback functionality

To avoid potential problems, you have to keep the following information in mind when using the Capture & Playback functionality:

Use the same language type during Playback as used during Capture. For example, if you recorded a Capture session while running the application using a Western language (such as English, German, Italian, and so on), you should perform the Playback while running the program in a Western language as well, rather than in an Eastern language (such as Chinese, Japanese, or Korean).
Open and Insert from File commands are not based on absolute paths. In fact, in addition to the log file, a folder with the same name as the log file is created. Within this folder, a RelatedFiles folder is created, containing a copy of any opened file and an index file ("index.txt").
During a Playback session, do not modify the window dimensions.
To capture long working sessions, you should do the following:
- split the session into several log files; the last command of each one will be a Save As, the first an Open;
- capture short sequences and use the Append Record command (it is recommended to save a backup copy of the intermediate log file — see details on Capture).

To ensure the portability of a log file and decrease the possibility of incorrect selections, adhere to the following rules:

When selecting an entire entity, pick the entity away from special points (such as intersection points) and away from other nearby entities.
When selecting a point, use the Snap tools.

Performing Playback outside the Capture & Playback environment

If you want to perform a Playback session outside the Capture & Playback environment, you should use the GPL function EK_PLAYBACK, present in the GPL library. Using this function (instead of the GPL PLAYBACK command) ensures that the initial parameter environment from the Capture session is correctly reproduced during the Playback session.

The syntax is:

> EK_PLAYBACK(file,opt)

where :

file

is a string of characters specifying the log file name

opt

is a string of characters specifying the Playback options :

'C' plays back the menu instructions recorded in accordance with the log file itself (default option). This option is incompatible with the 'N' option
'N' plays back the menu instructions recorded in accordance with the sequence of alphanumeric identifiers. This option is incompatible with the 'C' option
'S' plays back the log file recorded step by step
'E' displays a trace of the log file executed.

Format of the log file

The log file is organized into sections. (Note that you can edit a log file by using the Edit current file function, which opens the log file using the text editor program currently associated with ".txt" files).

The first section of the log file contains the version of the application which was used when recording, the version of Capture & Playback, the unit of measure, and the language:
> iomsg('Log file generated with 2009.1.108.490' )
> iomsg('C&P version : 244')
> iomsg('Unit of measure : Millimeters')
> iomsg('Language : English')
The second section contains all the instructions which reset all the automatic snap definitions:
>SNP.DEF 1 SNP.DES 'On' F.ENDP L.ENDP MIDP VERT CEN PIN WP.ORI T.CLE T.PO T.CU T.NSU T.LSU T.SU T.GRID T.IN.GROUP T.IN.SOL T.IN.PRO T.IN.3DPRO T.IN.VI T.IN.COMP T.IN.SYMB SNP.APPLY > SNP.DEF 2 SNP.DES 'All' F.ENDP L.ENDP PIN MIDP CEN WP.ORI A.TANG A.PERP ORI T.CLE T.PO T.CU T.TEXTS T.IN.GROUP T.IN.SOL T.IN.PRO T.IN.3DPRO T.IN.VI T.IN.COMP T.IN.SYMB SNP.APPLY
> SNP.DEF 3 SNP.DES 'Center' CEN T.CLE T.CU T.IN.GROUP T.IN.SOL T.IN.PRO T.IN.3DPRO T.IN.VI T.IN.COMP T.IN.SYMB SNP.APPLY
> SNP.DEF 4 SNP.DES 'On Entity' ON.ENT T.CLE T.CU T.TPATH T.IN.GROUP T.IN.SOL T.IN.PRO T.IN.3DPRO T.IN.VI T.IN.COMP T.IN.SYMB SNP.APPLY
The following section resets all the parameters (CPPARS command)
> CPPARS
> EP_CP_VERS 244 0
> EP_EK_F_VERS 1652 1
> EP_UNIT 0 0
> EP_NEW_VG2D 1 1
> EP_3D_REF_GRID_AX1_X 1 0
> C:\Program Files\\2009.1_480\\doc\samples
> ...
Other instructions reset the graphic area;

: START_OI "8957"
: GRSIZE "6 548 1020 681"
Then there are all the other recorded commands.

The Save As command is recorded this way:

<IDR_UITYPE*POPUP_CAT_FILE*ID_FILE_SAVE_AS>: ek_file_save(0)
: *IDR_FSBPLUS CFI 1
: *IDR_FSBPLUS DIR C:\models
: *IDR_FSBPLUS FILE block2.e3

Capture and Playback