Port Description - Multiple Ports Window
This window appears when you select multiple ports and click Describe
in the Port Settings window. It offers basic and advanced
options for describing the selected ports. To choose the set of options you
want, select Basic or Advanced from the list at the top of the
window. Then use the instructions for the choice you made.
These options let you create a two-part description
a
fixed word or phrase that will appear in every description, followed by a number
or letter that is incremented in each successive description.
Follow these steps:
- In the Fixed Text field, enter the text that will be repeated in
every port description.
- In the Increment field, enter a number or a letter. It will appear
in the description of the first selected port. If you enter a number, it will
be incremented by 1 in the description of each subsequent port. If you enter
a letter, it will be incremented to the next letter in alphabetic order in
the description of each subsequent port.
Example: If you enter Room in the Fixed Text field and
100 in the Increment field, the first port you selected will
have the description Room 100, the second will have the description
Room 101, and so on.
Note: If you need to create compound increments
for
example, 103-4B
you need the
advanced options.
- Click OK to enter your descriptions in the Port Settings window.
These options give you more levels of incrementation than the
basic options offer. Instead of creating descriptions like Room 100, Room
101, Room 102,... Room 120, you can create multilevel descriptions
like Room 100-1A, Room 100-1B, Room 100-1C,... Room 300-5E.
In this example, the room number has three parts, each of which is separately
incremented.
Follow these steps:
- In the Fixed Text field,
enter the text that will be repeated in every port description.
- Use the
entry fields in the First Level box as appropriate:
- In
the Connector field, enter a character that will precede the left-most
value that you want to increment. (A first-level connector is generally not used.)
- In
the Min field, enter the beginning left-most value (100 in the example)
that you want to increment.
- In the Max field, enter the highest
value that the min value can be incremented to. You can leave this field blank
if you do not want a limit on incrementing the min value.
- In the Increment
field, enter the increment to be used each time the min value is increased.
- Use
the entry fields in the Second Level box as appropriate:
- In the Connector field, enter a character that will precede the middle
value that you want to increment.
- In the Min field, enter the beginning
middle value (1 in the example) that you want to increment.
- In
the Max field, enter the highest value that the min value can be incremented
to. You can leave this field blank if you do not want a limit on incrementing
the min value.
- In the Increment field, enter the increment to be
used each time the min value is increased.
- Use the entry fields in
the Third Level box as appropriate:
- In the Connector
field, enter a character that will precede the middle value that you want to increment.
(None is used in the example.)
- In the Min field, enter the beginning
right-most value (A in the example) that you want to increment.
- In
the Max field, enter the highest value that the min value can be incremented
to.
- In the Increment field, enter the increment to be used
each time the min value is increased.
If the min value is a letter, the increment
shows how many letters to skip in ascending alphabetic sequence. If the increment
is 1, no letters are skipped; if it is 2, the increments from A would be C, E,
G, and so on.
- Click OK to enter your descriptions in the
Port Settings window.
Notes:
- Incrementation proceeds from right to left: the third-level value is incremented to its maximum
before the second-level value is incremented the first time. When the second-
and third-level values are incremented to their maximums, the first-level value
is incremented the first time. The entire incrementation process then reverts
to the third level.
- Even though the example shows letters used only at
the third level, you can use letters or numbers at any level.
- You can
use fewer than three levels. If you use only one or two, it does not matter which
ones you use.