What is Railroad Automation?
Railroad Automation started out in 2002 as a project I gave myself to quickly get up to speed on what was, at the time, Microsoft’s new .NET platform.
Combine that with my love for DCC (Digital Command Control) model railroads and the application grew to become a full featured toy box for model railroads
based on Digitrax’s
Loconet network. Over the years as the .NET feature set has evolved, I have
been able to add many interesting features to the application both as a learning tool and because it made the application that much more fun to operate.
I found that other model railroad DCC solutions available suffered from one or more of these problems which I wished to improve upon: un-user friendly,
antiquated, and sometimes downright ugly UIs, closed and not componentized, stiff and un-programmable. My goal was to provide prototypical model railroad
command and control utilizing modern technologies and providing a great deal of flexibility for third party developers or tinkerers. The latter was achieved
by breaking the application into distinct layers so consumers can choose the level of usability vs. flexibility they require.
| Element |
File |
Namespace |
Description |
| Loconet API |
RRAutoLib.dll |
RRAutoLib.Loconet |
The .NET library providing basic packet communication to/from Loconet. |
| Automation API |
RRAutoLib.dll |
RRAutoLib.CTC |
A higher level .NET library which is a Loconet library consumer; engine for Centralized Traffic Control. |
| Railroad Automation Application |
RRAuto.exe |
not exposed |
The WPF application that consumes both libraries wrapping them with a user friendly UI. Both libraries are also exposed
through the scripting interface from within the application. |
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Features
- Real time slot inspector with purging
- Loconet packet traffic inspector
- Full featured LocoIO programmer
- DCC decoder programmer
- Multiple throttle control
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- Editable vector based switchboard display
- Supports virtual objects such as: Tracks, Turnouts, Blocks, Routes, Sensors, Signals, Accessories
- Event Binding and Scripting
- Sequence recording
- Speech recognition control (Vista and above only)
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Downloads
Railroad Automation v2.0 has been rewritten in
WPF and the API now supports both Win Forms and WPF.
Please send bugs and/or suggestion to
Perecli@dslextreme.com.
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This software is provided for free, but if you like it, and want to support its development, donation of any size are welcome.
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Build v2.0.10 - Released 07/30/10
Launch - Railroad Automation
ClickOnce deployment. (Off-line
package)
Download - Railroad Automation sample layout file.
View - Railroad Automation class library documentation.
Download - Railroad Automation standalone DLL library and VS2010 sample projects. (for developers)
Other References:
Download - Free copy of Visual Studio 2010 Express.
Loconet-Checker - Application developed by Stefan Trachsler and powered by the Railroad Automation's API for management, configuration, and monitoring your Digitrax devices.
LoconetConfig - Application developed by Jeff Law and powered by the Railroad Automation's API for programming LocoIO boards.
Application Tutorials
Tutorial 1 - Getting connected to your Loconet interface.
Tutorial 2 - Introduction to the edit mode interface.
Upcoming - Starting a layout with track objects.
Upcoming - Adding blocks and binding sensors.
Upcoming - Adding routes.
Upcoming - Introduction to the operation mode.
Upcoming - Using engine throttles.
Upcoming - Introduction to scripting.
Upcoming - Controlling your layout with your voice.
Upcoming - Creating sequences and binding them with script.
Upcoming - Building a basic signaling system.
Upcoming - More advanced scripting techniques.
Upcoming - A look into the Loconet feature set.
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