Working with Eclipse

This section describes the general approach to C++ programming with Eclipse® IDE.

Creating a C++ project from a iCube Engineer Toolchain template

In Eclipse®, open the File → New → Project... menu.

The New Project window opens.
Select the iCube Engineer C++ Project wizard from the selection list and confirm your selection with Next.

The C++ Project window opens.
Enter a project name in the Project name input field.
For this example select iCube Engineer C++ Project
In the Toolchains area, select the iCube Engineer C++ Toolchain entry and confirm with Next.
Enter a name for the program and component in the corresponding input fields
Select the controller and firmware version for the project.
Finish the wizard and start creating the program.

Changing the settings later

You can change the above described settings after the project has been created:

Open the Project → Properties menu.
Select the iCube Engineer Targets option.
Remove controllers or add new controllers and their firmware version.
Click the Finish button.

Creating a C++ program

To create a C++ program which can be imported as a library into iCube Engineer, you must first prepare a new project in accordance with the description above.

The new project has a defined structure in which the C++ program is created, as shown in this example:

To create a program, proceed as follows:

Open the *.cpp source file.
Program the code to be executed during each ESM task cycle in the Execute() function (search for this comment: //TODO implement program).
After instantiation of a program, the assigned ESM task calls the Execute() function of the program instance in each cycle.

Adding or removing components and programs

Adding a component

Right click on the project.
Select New → iCube Engineer C++ Component.
Give the component a name. The namespace is by default the project namespace.
Assign the component to a project and click Finish.

Adding a program

Right click on the project.
Select New → iCube Engineer C++ Program.
Give the program a name. The namespace is by default the project namespace.
Assign the program to a project and select a parent component.
Click Finish and you will get the program source and header file.

Removing a component

Removing a C++ component from your project requires three steps exactly in this order:

Deleting the component itself
Reassigning all programs of the deleted component
Deleting all intermediate files of the deleted component

Now go ahead:

Delete the corresponding source and header file of your component.
Delete all programs assigned to this component or reassign them to another existing component.
To reassign a program, open the header file of the program and change the references to the component that owns this program. Use the Find/Replace function of Eclipse and search and replace all references by the new component name.
Remove all intermediate files from previous builds.
For this simply right click on your project and select Clean Project.

Removing a program

To remove a program simply delete the corresponding source and header file.
Select the two files, right click on them and choose delete in the menu.

Compiling the project

Prerequisites

In Eclipse®, open the Window → Preferences menu.
Select General → Workspace → Build.
Enable the Save automatically before build checkbox.
Make this setting separately for each workspace.

Procedure

Switch to the Project Explorer to compile the project.
Right-click to open the context menu for the project folder
(in the example: FirstProject1).
In the context menu, click on the Build Project.

If compilation was successful, a shared object (*.so) file for each target is generated. Otherwise, refer to the error and warning messages for remedy.

Using a C++ program with iCube Engineer

To be able to use your C++ program in iCube Engineer, you need it compiled into a *.pcwlx library for use with iCube Engineer. The LibraryBuilder (which is part of the C++ toolchain installed by PLCnext CLI) automatically generates the library within the process of compilation. The file is located in the project folder, e.g. C:/Users//workspace/FirstProject/Bin .

Import the library into your iCube Engineer project.
Assign the C++ program to a task.