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[FEATURE] WinCC OA Panel Explorer – Tree View for VS Code Extension (part of WinCC OA project explorer)

WinCC OA UI Panel Viewer (Research Proposal)

Problem​

Goal​

Create a VS Code “Panel Viewer” that displays panel content in a readable, structured form.

Primary use cases:

  • Inspect structure (shapes, properties, scripts/events, references)
  • Show raw property values (e.g., colors)
  • Preview the panel by launching WinCC OA UI with a -p panel path

Non-goals (v1)​

  • No full editor / authoring workflow
  • No promise of lossless XML↔PNL round-trip for arbitrary changes
  • No decryption or display of encrypted/protected panel contents

Minimal stable viewer model (v1)​

The viewer should be tolerant (no strict schema dependency in v1) and show:

  • Panel
    • properties (raw key/value)
    • shapes (tree)
      • per-shape properties
      • per-shape scripts (event-based)
      • nested shapes
    • panel references

Conversion strategy​

Where generated XML should live​

Two modes are needed:

  1. Viewer mode (default):

    • Convert .pnl → .xml into a temporary location.
    • Load into viewer.
    • Remove the temp XML after load.
    • Goal: eliminate two sources inside the project tree (.pnl and .xml).

  2. Command mode (explicit user action):

    • VS Code commands:
      • pnl → xml (single file)
      • xml → pnl (single file)
      • directory conversion (recursive)
    • Output goes next to the input file (same location) with .xml / .pnl extension.

Panels without extension​

If a panel file has no extension:

  • Ask user what to do:
    • treat as .pnl and convert to .xml
    • skip
    • apply choice once / apply for all (this run)

Change tracking​

  • When .pnl changes → re-convert and reload.
  • When .xml changes → compare against .pnl conversion output (do not blindly overwrite .pnl).
  • Ignore .bak files.

Encrypted panels​

Encrypted panels can be detected reliably:

  • First line starts with: PVSS_CRYPTED_PANEL

Viewer behavior:

  • Show “Encrypted panel; content not viewable” and stop parsing.

Preview behavior (WinCC OA UI)​

Preview should start WinCC OA UI with:

  • -p panels/relative/path/to/panel.pnl

and use the active project context.

References (conceptual):

Script viewing (CTL)​

  • Extract event scripts and display them as CTL.
  • Provide CTL syntax highlighting in VS Code (read-only in v1).

UX (minimal)​

  • Tree view of panel structure.
  • Every tree level uses an icon (similar semantics as file explorer):
    • panel root, shapes, properties, scripts/events, references
  • Details view shows:
    • property name + raw value
    • script contents

Performance note​

Provide a hint on first use/activation:

  • Working with .xml directly (when available) is typically faster than converting from .pnl repeatedly.

Validator (future)​

The XML schema + validator idea is tracked separately (not part of the first delivery).

Panel references (representation idea)​

Represent references explicitly in the tree as nodes with clear type:

  • Link/reference (points to another panel path)
  • Embedded instance (panel used as a component, if distinguishable in XML)

At minimum, show:

  • referenced panel path/name
  • where the reference occurs (shape id/name)

Placement in the ecosystem​

The Panel Viewer should be a module under a broader “WinCC OA Project Viewer”, but reusable standalone.

Potential modules:

  • config file viewer
  • progs/ viewer (raw + admin console/PMON)
  • log viewer (existing extension; integrate/align)
  • dp list viewer (.dpl raw + model preview + diff vs DB)
  • DB view (browse DB content)