MWM transport

Post questions, comments and feedback to our 3Dconnexion Windows Development Team.

Moderator: Moderators

Post Reply
kchase56
Posts: 8
Joined: Thu Mar 05, 2015 1:24 pm

MWM transport

Post by kchase56 »

Hi,
I'm working on an issue with an add-in for Solidworks 2015. We are seeing Solidworks 2015 setting the transport protocol in the XML config file as follows =>

<Transport>MWM</Transport>

Our add-in has a window that requires the S80 transport protocol =>

<Transport>S80</Transport>

When our add-in is running in Solidworks 2015 this no longer works.

The two questions that I have are as follows:

1.) What causes the transport protocol to be set to MWM?
2.) Can I force the transport protocol to use S80 for my add-in window? If so, how?


Any information that you could provide regarding this situation would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Ken C.
ngomes
Moderator
Moderator
Posts: 3321
Joined: Mon Nov 27, 2006 7:22 am
Contact:

Re: MWM transport

Post by ngomes »

Hi kchase56,

In the case of SolidWorks, the transport protocol is defined in the corresponding driver profile file, SolidWorks.xml.

If you are developing a SolidWorks add-in that also requires a connection to a 3D mouse driver, then it will conflict with 3Dconnexion's.

One solution is to change the driver profile to use S80 and disable (or uninstall) the 3Dconnexion add-in, which listed as "3Dcontrol" in the add-in manager panel of SolidWorks.

Your questions are interesting: can you add some details on the capabilities are you planning to add to SolidWorks that require 3D mouse data?
kchase56
Posts: 8
Joined: Thu Mar 05, 2015 1:24 pm

Re: MWM transport

Post by kchase56 »

Hi ngnomes,
ngomes wrote:Your questions are interesting: can you add some details on the capabilities are you planning to add to SolidWorks that require 3D mouse data?
Our add-in is Mastercam for SolidWorks which can launch a Verification program that interacts with 3Dconnexion devices, but it requires the S80 protocol.

This same Verification program gets launched from standalone Mastercam and there are no issues since Mastercam is also expecting S80 protocol.

I will try your suggestion and let you know if that works.

Why is the 3Dconnexion add-in forcing the protocol to MWM? Is there a technical reason/advantage to this protocol vs. the S80 protocol?

Thanks.
kchase56
Posts: 8
Joined: Thu Mar 05, 2015 1:24 pm

Re: MWM transport

Post by kchase56 »

Hi ngomes,
ngomes wrote:One solution is to change the driver profile to use S80 and disable (or uninstall) the 3Dconnexion add-in, which listed as "3Dcontrol" in the add-in manager panel of SolidWorks.
I tried this suggestion and it still didn't work.

Any other ideas?

Thanks,

Ken C.
ngomes
Moderator
Moderator
Posts: 3321
Joined: Mon Nov 27, 2006 7:22 am
Contact:

Re: MWM transport

Post by ngomes »

kchase56 wrote:
ngomes wrote:One solution is to change the driver profile to use S80 and disable (or uninstall) the 3Dconnexion add-in, which listed as "3Dcontrol" in the add-in manager panel of SolidWorks.
I tried this suggestion and it still didn't work.
Removing (uninstalling) the add-in turns SolidWorks to a 3D mouse agnostic program. Changing the driver default profile for SolidWorks to use S80 will enable the application to use that protocol.
kchase56 wrote:Any other ideas?
One idea is to shut down the driver and SolidWorks, ensure 3Dconnexion's add-in isn't installed, delete the default driver profile for SolidWorks (SolidWorks.xml in driver installation dir), restart driver and SolidWorks then load your add-in.

Another, less clever idea is checking if you're using a recent driver. Latest is included in v. 10.2.3 of 3DxWare 10. (You can download it here).
kchase56 wrote:Why is the 3Dconnexion add-in forcing the protocol to MWM? Is there a technical reason/advantage to this protocol vs. the S80 protocol
The add-in does not force: the driver is set to expect an MWM connection. There are reasons why we do this, of course.
kchase56
Posts: 8
Joined: Thu Mar 05, 2015 1:24 pm

Re: MWM transport

Post by kchase56 »

Hi ngomes,

1) 3DxWare version 3.18.0 works in both SolidWorks and Mastercam for SolidWorks Verify
2) 3DxWare version 10.2.3 works in SolidWorks but not in Mastercam for SolidWorks Verify

We didn't change anything on our end, so the only things that could cause this issue are the driver or the add-in.

Removing the SolidWorks 3dconnexion add-in from 3DxWare version 10.2.3 allows Mastercam for SolidWorks Verify to function somewhat correctly, but the movement is very choppy.

Any ideas on how we should proceed regarding this issue? Should our app be using the MWM protocol? If so, then how can we modify it so that the S80 protocol is no longer used?

Thanks,

Ken C.
ngomes
Moderator
Moderator
Posts: 3321
Joined: Mon Nov 27, 2006 7:22 am
Contact:

Re: MWM transport

Post by ngomes »

Hi kchase56,
Removing the SolidWorks 3dconnexion add-in from 3DxWare version 10.2.3 allows Mastercam for SolidWorks Verify to function somewhat correctly, but the movement is very choppy.
Did you also make the change to the protocol element in the SolidWorks.xml driver profile (found in the driver installation folder)?
Any ideas on how we should proceed regarding this issue? Should our app be using the MWM protocol? If so, then how can we modify it so that the S80 protocol is no longer used?
Moving your product to MWM is not an option (that protocol isn't supported for third-party use and is being phased out internally).

I believe the best course of action is to enable both protocols in the 3DxWare 10 driver for the same application. I'm reporting this internally to see what we can do immediately.
kchase56
Posts: 8
Joined: Thu Mar 05, 2015 1:24 pm

Re: MWM transport

Post by kchase56 »

ngomes wrote:Did you also make the change to the protocol element in the SolidWorks.xml driver profile (found in the driver installation folder)?
Yes we changed that and still had the choppy behaviour.

Thanks,

Ken C.
ngomes
Moderator
Moderator
Posts: 3321
Joined: Mon Nov 27, 2006 7:22 am
Contact:

Re: MWM transport

Post by ngomes »

kchase56 wrote:Yes we changed that and still had the choppy behaviour.
This is a concern. It also needs to be looked at.
kchase56
Posts: 8
Joined: Thu Mar 05, 2015 1:24 pm

Re: MWM transport

Post by kchase56 »

Hi ngnomes,

Any update on these issues?

Thanks,

Ken C.
ngomes
Moderator
Moderator
Posts: 3321
Joined: Mon Nov 27, 2006 7:22 am
Contact:

Re: MWM transport

Post by ngomes »

Hi kchase56,
Any update on these issues?
I was expecting you to have been contacted last week. I'm asking where they are with that. I'm sorry for the delay.
Post Reply