TouchDRO Settings Overview

By default TouchDRO is configured for a 3-axis vertical milling machine, but the configuration can be easily changed using the "DRO Settings" screen. The screen can be accessed through the context menu, using the "Setting" option.

General Settings

Preference Bank

Allows selecting between up to six preference banks. A preference bank is a virtual folder that contains all other application preferences. When the bank is changed, the application saves all current preferences and workspaces into a temporary storage and loads the preferences/workspaces from the newly selected bank.

The purpose of this feature is to provide a way to use a single tablet with up to six different machines. Future version of TouchDRO will automatically switch preference banks based on the connected device.

Preference Bank Name

User-friendly name for the currently selected preference bank. At this time the name appears only in the title of the “General Settings” section.

Machine Type

Determines what functions will be available in the main DRO screen, appearance of Z Axis Details screen, tool list, and point list.

Readout Display Format

Determines how many digits will be shown before and after the decimal point. The application will round the readout to fit the display rather than just cutting the extra digits of.

Readout Display Font

Provides a way to change the default font used by the axis readouts. The options are:

7-segment - a font that mimics a 7-segment LED display
Monospace - a typewriter-type font where each character takes the same amount of space
System - uses the default system font

Metric Mode

Sets millimeters as the default units in the user interface at startup. This has the same effect as toggling metric mode using the “inch/mm” button.

This setting has no effect on the “DRO Settings” activity. I.e. axis resolution will still need to be set in counts-per-inch.

Connection Settings

Use USB Connection

If checked, the application will use USB connection to connect to the scale interface controller.

USB Baud Rate

Sets the transfer rate in BAUD for the USB connection. This setting must match the setting in the scale interface controller or the application might not be able to read the input.

X Axis

Axis Label

Provides a way to override the default label that is used to the axis in the main display and some of the popup dialogs.

The value can be set to a non-empty string of any length, but if it’s too long some displays might appear broken.

Axis CPI

Set the number of counts per inch for the X axis. Values for most of the common scales can be found in the “TouchDRO Initial Setup” post, but for better results the scales should be calibrated as described here.

Invert Readout

Provides a way to invert the readout. This is intended to rectify a situation when the scales are mounted backwards.

Digital Filter

If set, the application will average up to 5 readings to reduce the flicker of the last digit when using capacitive scales. Please note, when the filter is enabled the effective refresh rate is five times slower, so there will be significant lag when using slow scales.

Y Axis

Enable Y Axis

When checked (default), the output from the Y axis will be displayed in the main DRO screen.

This setting has no effect on the function dialogs. I.e. even if the Y axis is disabled, Y dimension input will still appear on some dialogs.

The rest of the settings are identical to the X axis.

Z Axis

Identical to the Y axis.

W Axis

W Axis Mode

Provides a way to change the display mode for the W axis. The options are:

Display (default) - the readout will be shown in the DRO screen just like the other three axes, taking into account the “Enable W Axis” setting.
Add to X Readout - the readout will be added to the X axis readout.
Add to Y Readout - the readout will be added to the X axis readout.
Add to Z Readout - the readout will be added to the X axis readout.

Please note, if one of the latter three options is selected, the application will automatically pre-scale and normalize the readout for both axes. In other words, the CPI and “Invert Readout” settings can be set to different values for the two axes in question.