New in Designer 2.3. Contents. Highlights. Presets, Duplicate, API. pharoscontrols.com

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1 Presets, Duplicate, API Contents Welcome to Pharos Designer 2.3, which introduces great new workflow and integration features. We've also fixed some bugs. This document contains the following items: Highlights Presets o UI improvements o User presets o Gradient editor tools Duplicate and auto-patch TPC API o New HTTP API for third-party integration o Script editor New features overview Highlights Improved preset setup, including ability to save your own presets Auto-patch during fixture duplication Use any font for a TPC interface; added support for line break Minimap - a handy navigation and zoom tool for fixture layouts, enabled from the toolbar VLC blur effect for improved video presentation on low resolution installations Improved KiNET management tools Hold/repeat options for contact closure and digital input triggers Preset settings on VLC allow cropping of media content New HTTP API for integration with a third-party device or web server 1/8

2 Presets UI improvements The Preset section has received a significant update in Designer 2.3. All available presets (group and matrix effects) are placed in the Built-in tab, and some default looks and names have been adjusted. We have also added the new Tiles preset. When selecting a preset, the timeline rows that do not support this preset are masked. As before, effects are dragged to the timeline and holding Shift allows you to apply presets in painter mode. Many of the old group presets can now be used on pixel matrices and the VLC. You can now filter presets to make it easier to find a suitable effect for a specific timeline row. 2/8

3 User presets New in Designer 2.3 Once you ve adjusted the settings of a preset to your requirements, you can now save your own version of the preset with those particular settings for easy reuse. When you click the Save button, your own version of the preset will be created in the User tab. Right-click on a preset in the User tab to rename or delete it. All saved presets are local to your computer and can be used in future projects. The saved presets can also be filtered by their supported timeline rows. Gradient editor tools Right-clicking in a gradient editor offers a selection of tools to quickly create new looks by manipulating the gradient stops. This feature is still in beta, but please experiment and send us your feedback. 3/8

4 Duplicate fixtures and auto-patch New in Designer 2.3 Duplicate is a handy and commonly used function when creating layouts for larger installations. It is accessed by right-clicking a fixture on the layout. The Duplicate fixtures wizard has been expanded to help you patch your fixtures in the same action. The first window asks you to define the fixture quantity and spacing, as before. You can Finish there, or click Next to define the start corner and the numbering direction of the fixtures. The final screen now lets you configure an automatic patch of the duplicated fixtures. You can decide how your patch should flow across multiple universes or KiNET power supply ports. 4/8

5 The result is a grid of fixtures numbered in the direction you chose and already patched. You can always manually modify the patch if required. 5/8

6 TPC New in Designer 2.3 When creating a new interface, you can now load a custom font (a.ttf or.ttc file), including fonts with extended character sets like Chinese, Korean and Japanese. In the interface preview you can see what your font will look like. You can change the font at any time by clicking Properties on the toolbar. The Caption fields for TPC control now support line breaks just add the character combination: \n Finally, when you add a new page to an interface you ll see that two new themes (Dark and Light) have been added. 6/8

7 API New HTTP API for third-party integration Pharos has always had multiple API options to allow other equipment, web servers, web clients, etc. to query and control Pharos hardware. We are now taking the next step towards exposing far more Pharos controller features and unifying the functionality of the APIs. In Designer 2.3 we are providing an integrated API approach with 3 API protocols: Lua API (used internally in Designer with scripted conditions, actions and advanced variable manipulation) JavaScript query API (used with custom web interfaces and custom web-based applications) HTTP API (NEW! - used with external devices/software to communicate with a controller) While earlier versions of Designer 2 supported Lua and JavaScript query APIs, there were some differences between their functionality and the legacy HTTP API from Designer 1 wasn t available. The new RESTful HTTP API provides control & query functions for any Pharos controller via HTTP requests with JSON responses. All API methods now share the same functionality. As a further enhancement, we are versioning our API future changes to the API will be tracked with a version number. You can choose which version to use from Project Properties in Designer, so you may safely upgrade to a newer version of Designer with new API functionality without breaking your integrations. When you re ready, you can switch your project to the latest API version. Existing project files created in Designer 2.2 and earlier will continue to use the legacy API until the User API version is set to 1.0 in Project Properties. Script editor The script editor in Designer now supports Find. Use the keyboard shortcut Ctrl+F (Windows) or Cmd+F (OS X) to display the search bar above the script editor. 7/8

8 New features overview New features in 2.3 Layout Minimap - a handy navigation and zoom tool for fixture layouts, enabled from the toolbar Auto-patch with fixture duplication - when duplicating fixtures, there is now an option to automatically patch the fixtures in any row/column order Timeline Save timeline presets - all built-in presets are now listed together and custom configurations of these presets may be saved for reuse Clearer preset naming and thumbnail preview to distinguish presets more effectively in the new Built-in folder. Presets may be filtered by the type of timeline rows that they support Timeline rows change appearance to indicate even more clearly which rows a preset can be dropped on in the painter mode New Tiles timeline preset, plus many presets that were previously restricted to fixture/group timeline rows may now be placed on pixel matrix or VLC timeline rows New gradient workflow tools (beta) - to access, right-click on the gradient editor in the properties of a timeline preset Background & text colours are now independent in the Text preset Media file format information displayed in media library Trigger Trigger variables and custom presets now hidden in new projects by default to simplify experience for new users New project feature button to enable advanced features in situ Hold/repeat options for contact closure and digital input triggers Search in script editor (beta) - use keyboard shortcut Ctrl+F (Windows) or Cmd+F (OS X) TPC - Interface VLC Change TPC font - choose the font to use for a TPC interface, including fonts with extended character sets New themes added to installer - the Dark and Light themes that have been available for download are now directly available within Designer The TPC page name is captured as a variable by TPC control triggers Line break now supported in TPC control captions, using \n VLC blur effect, available as a trigger action Intensity master trigger actions now support VLC Crop media presets on VLC timeline rows Patch Support for custom KiNET power supply configuration, which also allows KiNET power supplies to be imported from Philips Color Kinetics Video Management Tool map files Public API New HTTP API for integration with a third-party device or web server The version of the Lua API, JavaScript API and new HTTP API can be chosen in Project Properties Please see the What s New section in Designer Help for more details on features not described in this document, where the feature list now includes links directly to the relevant reference sections. 8/8