Object (Screen) Properties
The Object supports the following properties, which are available via the Properties pane and the Canvas script editor. Click next to any property name in the Properties pane to see a short description for the selected property.
See Accessing Screen Objects for more information about how to view control objects in script in the Canvas application.
Note: In script, the Object container is always referred to as Screen.
Categorizing, Sorting, and Finding Properties
You can click
(Categorize), click
(Alphabetical within Category) or click
(Search) within the properties using the features located immediately above the properties list. The search box is useful to help locate a property when an object contains many properties. For clarity, when you enter a search term, items matching your entry string remain displayed and non-matching items are temporarily hidden. Clear the search box to display the full properties list again.
You can expand and collapse each property category by clicking
or
next to the group name or simply clicking anywhere in the category heading.
Object (Screen) Properties
The following tables describe the property names visible in the Properties pane user interface (UI) and the corresponding script property name.
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* Applies to a Default chart
| UI Property | Script Property | Description | |
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ControlName |
The Name property specifies the unique identifier for this control. Valid characters are A-Z, 0-9, and underscore (_). Special characters and spaces are not permitted. Names cannot start with a number; an underscore will be prefixed if the control name starts with a number. The default value is the object name and the numeric instance. The control's Name is also displayed on the Controls view of the Screen pane. |
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ControlType |
The read-only Type property displays the type for the control: Button, Chart, CygNet Grid, Edit Box, Object Container, Search Box, Tag Chooser, etc. … The control's Type is also displayed on the Controls view of the Screen pane. |
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Styles are created in two ways:
Tip: You can also change a control's Style on the Controls view of the Screen pane. |
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Screen
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BackgroundColor |
The Background color property specifies the color used for the background of the control. Click |
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BackgroundColorSource |
The Background color source property specifies the color source for the background color of the screen, object, or control. Two options are available:
The default option is Auto. |
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ColorPalette ColorPalette.ColorPaletteId ColorPalette.ColorPaletteDescription |
See Configuring Color Palettes for more information. |
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CustomContextMenuItems |
The custom context menu options will appear at the bottom of the fixed context menu options, separated by a line. Each custom context menu item has a title and an event script ID; items can be designated as a separator; and custom context menus support nested menu items. Click |
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Context menu items > Title |
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Context menu items > Is separator |
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Context menu items > Script event ID |
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IsPanZoomControlsVisible |
The Is pan zoom control visible check box indicates whether to display the pan and zoom control on the screen in run mode. Pan and zoom are always enabled in design mode; the control is optional in run mode. |
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IsPanZoomEnabled |
The Is pan/zoom enabled check box indicates whether the user can pan horizontally and vertically or zoom in and out of the screen. Both panning and zooming change the view — the current location and magnification of the screen. Every time you zoom or pan, you establish a new view. Pan and zoom are always enabled in design mode; the control is optional in run mode. Note: Enabling this will negatively impact screen load performance and disable the ability to dynamically add controls via script. Note: The new run mode implemented in Canvas v9.4 and later does not support panning and zooming. Thus, Canvas has retained the old method of running screens for backwards compatibility. If you need to pan and zoom on a specific screen (configured via the IsPanZoomEnabled property on a screen), you will not be able to take advantage of the performance improvements the new run mode supports. The legacy run mode is accessible from the Run icon on the Canvas toolbar: Run > Run current screen (Legacy). |
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Title |
The Title property specifies the title of the screen. |
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UniqueName |
The Unique name property specifies a unique name for the screen (corresponding to a globally unique ID (GUID)), which is used when creating an assembly for the screen's script. When a screen is saved, any script assemblies are compiled into a uniquely named .dll file and added to the .can file, so the script does not have to be recompiled every time the screen is run. When a screen is loaded in Canvas preview or Canvas.View, the precompiled .dll is extracted to a temporary folder and the script assembly is loaded from disk resulting in faster load times by removing the need to recompile script. This property specifies that unique name. Under most circumstances, this will not need to be changed and can be ignored. See Screen Load Time for more information. |
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Default Chart ![]() |
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DateStart DateStart.Date DateStart.Day DateStart.DayOfWeek DateStart.DayOfYear DateStart.Hour DateStart.Kind DateStart.Millisecond DateStart.Minute DateStart.Month DateStart.Second DateStart.Ticks DateStart.TimeOfDay DateStart.Year |
The Begin date or Start or Start date property specifies the start date and time for a control (or screen or chart or column) for an absolute date and time view window. The format is MM/DD/YYYY hh:mm:ss AM/PM. The default value is the system date and time at which the control was first added to the screen. Click See Default Chart for more information. |
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RelativeStart |
The Begin relative date or Relative start date or Start property specifies a wildcard string defining the amount of time by which to adjust the start date and time. The space-separated elements in this string must be of the form: "x-#", "x+#", or "x=#" where # is an integer and x is one of the following unit specifiers: y — Year, m — Month, d — Day, H — Hour, M — Minute, S — Second, and # is an integer. T wildcard is also supported and must be in the form: T, T+#, T-#, where T represent today at midnight, T-1 is yesterday at midnight, and T+1 is tomorrow at midnight, etc. Any integer can be used. For example, H-8 represents data from the 8 hours before the current hour, d+3 represents data 3 days after the current day, and d+2 H+1 M+30 represents data 2 days, 1 hour and 30 minutes after the current date and time. d-4 H=6 sets the relative start date and time to four days ago (d-4) at 6:00 a.m. (H=6). See Date and Time Wildcards for more information about adjusting relative time. See Default Chart for more information. |
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DefaultChartFile |
See Default Chart for more information. |
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DefaultChartFileSource |
This property specifies the source of the file, object file, screen file, image file, or video file. Options include:
See Default Chart for more information. |
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DateEnd DateEnd.Date DateEnd.Day DateEnd.DayOfWeek DateEnd.DayOfYear DateEnd.Hour DateEnd.Kind DateEnd.Millisecond DateEnd.Minute DateEnd.Month DateEnd.Second DateEnd.Ticks DateEnd.TimeOfDay DateEnd.Year |
The End date or End property specifies the end date and time for a control (or screen or chart or column) for an absolute date and time view window. The format is MM/DD/YYYY hh:mm:ss AM/PM. The default value is the system date and time at which the control was first added to the screen. Click See Default Chart for more information. |
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RelativeEnd |
The End relative date or Relative end date or End property specifies a wildcard string defining the amount of time by which to adjust end date and time. The space-separated elements in this string must be of the form: "x-#", "x+#", or "x=#" where # is an integer and x is one of the following unit specifiers: y — Year, m — Month, d — Day, H — Hour, M — Minute, S — Second, and # is an integer. T wildcard is also supported and must be in the form: T, T+#, T-#, where T represent today at midnight, T-1 is yesterday at midnight, and T+1 is tomorrow at midnight, etc. Any integer can be used. For example, H-8 represents data from the 8 hours before the current hour, d+3 represents data 3 days after the current day, and d+2 H+1 M+30 represents data 2 days, 1 hour and 30 minutes after the current date and time. d-4 H=6 sets the relative end date and time to four days ago (d-4) at 6:00 a.m. (H=6). See Date and Time Wildcards for more information about adjusting relative time. See Default Chart for more information. |
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OverrideChartDates |
See Default Chart for more information. |
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RollupPeriod |
Note: If rollups are configured for a default chart four labeled rollup series will be added to the chart:
See Default Chart for more information. |
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RollupUnit |
For instance, if you select Minutes, rollups occur on a minute basis. The interval is further defined by the Rollup Period setting, which defines how many (in this case) minutes long a rollup period is. See Default Chart for more information. |
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RollupTopSubUnit |
Using the example of hours and minutes, if the starting time of an item would otherwise have been 09:00 AM, if subunits is set to 15, the starting time of that item would be 09:15 AM. See Default Chart for more information. |
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UseRelativeTime |
The Use relative date check box indicates whether to use relative dates and time for the chart. Use the Begin/Start and End properties to specify the relative date ranges to use in the chart. If Use relative date is unchecked all dates and time will be absolute. Use the Begin/Start and End properties to specify the absolute date ranges to use in the chart. See Default Chart for more information. |
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CygNet
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IsBroadcastingFacilities |
The Broadcast facilities check box indicates whether to notify other screens when this screen's facility selection changes. When enabled, and when a screen's facility selection changes, Canvas will broadcast the list of facilities out to all other screens open in the application that are configured to source their facility from <Broadcast>. See Interscreen Communication for more information about using this property. |
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IsBroadcastingSiteService |
The Broadcast SiteService check box indicates whether to notify other screens when this screen's SiteService selection changes. When enabled, and when a screen's SiteService selection changes, Canvas will broadcast the SiteService out to all other screens open in the application that are configured to source their SiteService from <Broadcast>. See Interscreen Communication for more information about using this property. |
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CygNetConfiguration |
The CygNet connection property is used to configure the facility and SiteService associated with this control or screen. Two selection modes are available: a) by Facility tag or b) by SiteService / Facility. This split configuration allows for the inheritance of these properties from other controls, or the specific configuration of the SiteService or the facility, while dynamically changing the other. This use case may be rare; therefore, the Facility tag option is the default. Click |
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Selection mode |
CygNetConfiguration.SelectionMode |
The Selection mode property is used to determine how the control will receive CygNet information from other controls or from itself. Two options are available; click the desired radio button:
Sending and receiving facility tagsSome controls on the same screen allow for the sending of facility information from one control to another.
ExampleAdd a control to a screen (e.g., a Tag Chooser or Grid) and configure it as a facility sender to send a facility to the screen. Add another control to the screen (e.g., a Text Tool or Donut) and configure it to receive the facility from the screen. In this scenario the Tag Chooser or Grid will send a facility to the screen and the screen will then send the facility to a Text Tool or the Donut. |
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Facility tag CygNet conn > Facility |
CygNetConfiguration.Facility
CygNetConfiguration.Facility.FacilityID CygNetConfiguration.Facility.FacilityID.IsBroadcastSourced CygNetConfiguration.Facility.FacilityID.IsOrderInType CygNetConfiguration.Facility.FacilityID.IsOrderInTypeAttributeConfigured CygNetConfiguration.Facility.FacilityID.IsRelative CygNetConfiguration.Facility.FacilityID.IsSelfSourced CygNetConfiguration.Facility.FacilityID.OrderInType CygNetConfiguration.Facility.FacilityID.RelativeFacilityLink CygNetConfiguration.Facility.FacilityID.ResolveRelativeFacility CygNetConfiguration.Facility.FacilityID.Source CygNetConfiguration.Facility.FacilityID.SourceFacilityID CygNetConfiguration.FacilityTag
CygNetConfiguration.FacilityTag.FacilityId CygNetConfiguration.FacilityTag.Service CygNetConfiguration.FacilityTag.Site CygNetConfiguration.FacilityTag.SiteService CygNetConfiguration.FacilityTag.SiteService.Service CygNetConfiguration.FacilityTag.SiteService.Site CygNetConfiguration.SourceFacilityTag
CygNetConfiguration.SourceFacilityTag.FacilityId CygNetConfiguration.SourceFacilityTag.Service CygNetConfiguration.SourceFacilityTag.Site CygNetConfiguration.SourceFacilityTag.SiteService CygNetConfiguration.SourceFacilityTag.SiteService.Service CygNetConfiguration.SourceFacilityTag.SiteService.Site CygNetConfiguration.SourceFacilityTagString IsRelativeFacilityResolutionEnabled |
The Facility tag or Facility property is where you specify the source of the facility for the control (or screen) to use. The source for the facility can be explicitly configured for this control or it can be received from another control on the same screen, or from the screen, or from another screen. Click
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SiteService |
CygNetConfiguration.SiteService
CygNetConfiguration.SiteService.DisplayString CygNetConfiguration.SiteService.DomainSiteService CygNetConfiguration.SiteService.DomainSiteService.DomainId CygNetConfiguration.SiteService.DomainSiteService.Service CygNetConfiguration.SiteService.DomainSiteService.Site CygNetConfiguration.SiteService.DomainSiteService.SiteService CygNetConfiguration.SiteService.DomainSiteService.SiteService.Service CygNetConfiguration.SiteService.DomainSiteService.SiteService.Site CygNetConfiguration.SiteService.IsBroadcastSourced CygNetConfiguration.SiteService.IsSelfSourced CygNetConfiguration.SiteService.SiteService CygNetConfiguration.SiteService.SiteService.Service CygNetConfiguration.SiteService.SiteService.Site CygNetConfiguration.SiteService.Source GetCygNetSiteServiceSenders GetCygNetSiteServiceSenders.Method GetCygNetSiteServiceSenders.Target |
The SiteService property is where you specify the source of the SiteService for the control (or screen) to use. The source for the SiteService can be explicitly configured for this control or it can be received from another control on the same screen, or from the screen, or from another screen. Click
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Facility Navigation
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FacilityNavigationMode |
The default value is Hyperlink - Open. See Navigation by Facility for more information about using this property. |
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Grid
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GridColor |
The Grid color property specifies the color of the lines in the layout grid. Click |
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GridColorSource |
The Grid color source property specifies the color source for the layout grid on the screen. Two options are available:
The default options is Auto. |
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GridHeight |
The Grid height property specifies the height of the layout grid. The default is 10 pixels high. |
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GridWidth |
The Grid width property specifies the width of the layout grid. The default is 10 pixels wide. |
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ShowGrid |
The Show grid property indicates whether to show the grid lines in design mode. By default the layout grid will be displayed. The grid will always be hidden in run mode. |
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SnapToGrid |
The Snap to grid property indicates whether controls should snap to the grid. The default value is true. |
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SnapToItems |
The Snap to items property indicates whether controls should snap to other controls. The default value is true. |
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Location
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Height |
The Height property specifies the height of the control (or screen). Tip: You can also change the height of a control using the Settings pane (click on the |
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Width |
The Width property specifies the width of the control (or screen). Tip: You can also change the width of a control using the Settings pane (click on the |
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Default Series ![]() |
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DefaultLabelBackgroundColor |
Click See Default Chart for more information. |
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DefaultLabelConnectorColor |
Click See Default Chart for more information. |
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DefaultLabelForegroundColor |
Click See Default Chart for more information. |
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DefaultPointSize |
See Default Chart for more information. |
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DefaultSeriesType |
The Series type property specifies the style to use for the chart series. Click
Click here to see an example of each type of series. See Default Chart for more information. |
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DefaultShowPointLabels |
See Default Chart for more information. |
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DefaultShowPoints |
See Default Chart for more information. |
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Global Settings
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GlobalSettingsFile |
The Path property specifies the path to the global settings file (.gsf) for the screen or object. When a new screen is configured, the path to the global settings file specified in the General Settings is copied to the screen. See Configuring Global Settings for more information about this file. The global settings file must be saved in the BSS. Click |
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GlobalSettingsSource |
The Source property specifies the source of the global settings file for the screen or object. When a new screen is configured, the path to the global settings file specified in the General Settings is copied to the screen. See Configuring Global Settings for more information about this file. The global settings file must be saved to the BSS. |
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Alarm Notifier
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ShowAlarmBanner |
Note: Alarm sounds will still play in the screen, even if Show alarm notifier property is disabled (Off). |
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The Script event ID specifies the event ID that will be called when the menu item is selected from the runtime right-click context menu. The event ID is passed in as a parameter into the Custom Context Menu Action event, along with other relevant information in the context of the click, for example, facility or point tag, as appropriate.