Tag: Tip

TigerStop – Tip #1

7 Mar 2018 Darren Young

More and more mechanical contractors are installing and using TigerStops. The company has been around for a long time in a number of industries but only recently have they started to get noticed by mechanical contractors. If you’re unfamiliar with them, you can find out more from their web site www.tigerstop.com. You may also want to view their Blog post about one mechanical contractor’s experience with them here.  I’ll be posting a few tips going forward as I get more familiar with them. To get you started, here’s my first Tip.

Install TigerTouch software on your computer

One of the options you can buy when getting a TigerStop, is the Tablet package that consists of a Windows Surface PC with the TigerTouch software. This package provides your TigerStop with a much friendlier interface that can be used to control your TigerStop controller.

While this software is used to control your machine, you can also install it on any computer. Simply download the Full installer from TigerStop’s web site and install. Installing on another computer has several benefits….

  • Test, and learn some of the software workflow in a safe more comfortable environment. This is a great way to train your shop staff how to use the interface without taking your machine out of production and without wasting any material.
  • Allow you to more easily get screen captures and produce documentation for your staff.
  • Test new software builds before updating your machine.

When the TigerTouch software starts, it notifies you that it can’t find a machine connected. That’s perfectly fine, just click cancel so it doesn’t try to look again.

From here, you can now use many of the functions of the software. When you click START, instead of the software waiting for your saw to operate, your cut lists are just processed automatically for for each stock size you enter. Here’s a video of the software opening a Cut List and processing it on my system which is NOT connected to an actual TigerStop machine.

One last item…When TigerTouch installs, it assumes you’re installing a machine so it’s configured to automatically run when you log into Windows. To stop this, simply remove the TigerTouch Shortcut in the Windows Startup folder. The shortcut is located here:

C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\StartUp

When you’re browsing to this folder you may not see the ProgramData folder because it’s a Windows System folder which by default is configured to be hidden. Simply type in the folder name and you’ll be able to browse to that folder.

Programmer’s Trick: Custom Number Rounding

12 Oct 2017 Darren Young

Most programming languages have a function to round a number to the closest whole number using standard math rules. Anything fraction of a number < 1/2 typically rounds down and any fraction of a number >= 1/2 rounds up. In Visual Basic, there’s a “Round” function, C# has a “Round” method and Excel even has a “Round” function.

  • 1.0 already a whole number, rounded value remains 1.0
  • 1.25 rounds DOWN to 1.0
  • 1.49 rounds DOWN to 1.0
  • 1.5 rounds UP to 2.0
  • 1.75 rounds UP to 2.0
  • 2.0 already a whole number, rounded value remains 2.0
  • …etc…

Some languages lisp AutoLISP, doesn’t have a function that behaves like this. Instead, AutoLISP had a “FIX” function that rounds down, regardless of the fractional component.

  • 1.0 already a whole number, rounded down remains 1.0
  • 1.25 rounded down becomes 1.0
  • 1.49 rounded down becomes 1.0
  • 1.5 rounded won becomes 1.0
  • 1.75 rounded down becomes 1.0
  • 2.0 already a whole number, rounded down remains 2.0
  • …etc…

If you use a language like AutoLISP that only drops the fractional component of a number (essentially always rounding down) to function like real math rules, this is easily accomplished by simply adding 0.5 to the number before rounding. This changes the resulting rounded number to the same as traditional mathematics would round the numbers.

  • 1.0 + 0.5 = 1.5 rounded down becomes 1.0
  • 1.25 + 0.5 = 1.75 rounded down becomes 1.0
  • 1.49 + 0.5 = 1.99 rounded down becomes 1.0
  • 1.5 + 0.5 = 2.0 rounded down becomes 2.0
  • 1.75 + 0.5 = 2.25 rounded down becomes 2.0
  • 2.0 + 0.5 = 2.5 rounded down becomes 2.0
  • …etc…

So far, this is quite simple. But what if you wanted to round to the nearest 1/8? Or 1/2?  Again, many of the rounding functions in programming languages have the ability to round to a certain number of decimal places by specifying the number of decimal places as an argument to the rounding function. This works great on decimal values where you want to round to the nearest 1/10 (0.1), or 1/100 (0.01). However, this doesn’t work in other fraction that are not base 10. Rounding to the nearest 1/8 yields 3 decimals (0.125) but 2/8 (1/4) yields 2 decimal places (0.25) and 4/8 (1/2) yields in 1 decimal place (0.5). So how is this done?

Quite simply actually. You can use another technique which shifts the decimal. This moves the fractional component you want to keep to the left of the decimal and leaves the remaining fractional components to the right of the decimal where you can round them off. It sounds more complicated than it is.  Let’s look at how this works by focusing on 1/8 (0.125).

What happens when we multiply 1/8 (0.125) by a factor of 8? We get 1.0 which when rounded, stays 1.0, we then divide by 8 again which shifts the decimal back to where it belongs and we end up with out original number as follows…

0.125 * 8 = 1.0  rounded stays 1.0 / 8 = 0.125 (1/8)

Now let’s try this when the number is slightly larger….

0.126 * 8 = 1.008 rounded becomes 1.0 / 8 = 0.125 (1/8)

The key is…if you want to round to the nearest 1/8, you “MULTIPLY by 8, ROUND, then DIVIDE by 8″.  You can also use the inverse formula “DIVIDE by 1/8, ROUND, then MULTIPLY by 1/8″. Either formula works.

The same technique works if you want to round to the nearest 2 (even) or 3 (3, 6, 9, etc.).

  • 0.25 / 2 = 0.125 becomes 0.0 * 2 = 0.0
  • 0.5 / 2 = 0.25 rounded becomes 0.0 * 2 = 0.0
  • 1.0 / 2 = 0.5 rounded becomes 1.0 * 2 = 2.0
  • 1.99 / 2 = 0.995 rounded becomes 1.0 * 2 = 2.0
  • 2.00 / 2 =  1.0 rounded becomes 1.0 * 2 = 2.0
  • 2.99 / 2 = 1.495 rounded becomes 1.0 * 2 = 2.0
  • 3.0 / 2 = 1.5 rounded becomes 2.0 * 2 = 4.0
  • 3.5 / 2 = 1.75 rounded becomes 2.0 * 2 = 4.0

Using these techniques, you can quickly convert numbers into the rounded format of your liking, regardless of the programming language you use.