Flatten system composer view, see level 1 and 2 components together

Hi all,

I'm trying to use System Composer to draw a control system physical architecture diagram. I want to show the buildings, cabinets, controllers in the cabinets and the network connections between them. I have used Areas for the buildings, which is not ideal but okay as the buildings aren't a functional part of the diagram. I'm showing the cabinets and controllers as components and using physical connections between them for the networks. I also show network switches as physical components.

This is all fine, however it's not perfect. I want to be able to show the controllers and switches in the cabinets, with their connections, in the same drawing as the overall drawing of cabinets within the buildings and network connections between them. The best I've been able to do is condense the arrangement of internal components and enlarge the cabinet component to make the internal components look bigger, but they're still not shown as first class citizens at the top level view.

Is there a way to do this flattened view? I did try architecture view, which is nice but the lines are a mess because I can't figure out how to move the connectors (they don't seem movable at al, are they?).

Cheers :)

Answer 1

[Josh Kahn]

Hey Will,

Views is definitely the best way to visualize your architecture in a flattened manner. In R2022b, you can select a port in the view and use the keyboard arrows to change the order of the ports. Between that and being able to move/resize components in the view, you should be able to get the line routing cleaned up. Let me know if you still run into any issues after that.

Josh

[will]

Hi @Josh Kahn,

That has worked very well, thank you! I'd still like to be able to show Area shapes on the architectural view, but I haven't found a way to do this and I presume it's not possible? I want to be able to show which building and room things are in (I've been asked to do this) so on the main modelling view I use Area shapes as I don't want these buildings and rooms to appear as components, because functionally they're not part of the model.

Cheers :)

[Josh Kahn]

Hi @will,

Glad to hear that worked out for you!

From an architecture modeling standpoint, you would ideally create a separate architecture model that represents your physical space - buildings, rooms, and cabinets, then use the allocation editor to allocate your controllers to the building.

I understand you are being asked to represent this all in one view though so can you try using groups in your views to represent buildings and rooms and see if that gets you what you need? You can create a group by selecting one or more components or groups in your view and then pressing the Group button in the ribbon.

Regards,

Josh

[will]

Hi Josh, thanks for the suggestions. I don't think that the separate architecture model for the buildings is worth the time I would need to invest in it. And as you say it wouldn't satify the one-view criteria. I had a quick go with Groups in the architecture view and I think it could work so I'll try with that.

Thanks :)

[Josh Kahn]

Hi @will, glad that I was able to help! Good luck and feel free to accept my answer :-)