GlowDTF

GlowDTF is a tech demo for controlling GDTF lighting fixtures over Art-Net.

GDTF stands for General Device Type Fixture. It is an open file format to describe the functionality of lighting fixtures in the entertainment industry, like LED bars, scanners or moving heads. You can find more details in the GDTF Resources below.

GlowDTF allows you to patch GDTF 1.1 (DIN SPEC 15800:2020-07) fixtures and control their Channel Functions with a simple slider interface. The DMX values are broadcast to the local network over Art-Net.

The application consists of a browser frontend written in React/TypeScript and a Kotlin/JVM server. The GDTF parser is machine-generated in Java from the official XML Schema with xjc/JAXB.

Being a tech demo, GlowDTF should not be relied upon to work in production situations. Since there are no security measures, you should only use GlowDTF in a secure local network. There are no plans for continued development. However, if you find any unexpected behavior or just want to tell us what you think about our demo, feel free to open an issue anyway.

How To Run

• Make sure you have Java 11 or higher installed (How To)
  • If not, you can install it for example from Adoptium
• Download the jar file from our Releases
• Run the jar by double-clicking on it, or if your prefer the command line:

java -jar glowdtf-0.0.1-dev-all.jar

• You should see the Javalin server start up in the terminal. Open the browser and navigate to http://localhost:7000. You should see the empty GlowDTF main screen.

Things to Try Out

Add a GDTF

• Open the patch by clicking on the button in the upper right
• Navigate to the "Fixture Types" tab and click "Add GDTF"
• Select a GDTF file and confirm
• The GDTF file will show up in the table. Click on it to see Details on the right.
• Click "Show ModeMaster Dependencies" below the DMX channel list to show the dependency graph (only visible if there are ModeMaster dependencies). You can drag the nodes around and zoom with the mouse wheel.

Patch a Fixture

• Switch to the "Fixtures" tab in the patch and click "Add New Fixtures". Make your settings and confirm with "Add Fixtures". Your fixtures should show up in the Fixture table.
• To go back to the main screen, click the Exit button in the upper left

Control the Fixture

• On the main screen, select a fixture in the table on the left. Its channel functions show up as sliders on the right. Drag them to change the DMX output.
• The DMX values are output via Art-Net to the address 255.255.255.255 (local network broadcast address), so should reach all devices in your local network. The Art-Net universes are numbered from 0 to 32767 and can be set in the Fixture Patch.
• The channel function sliders react to out-of-range and ModeMaster values. If their name is written in gray but the slider is enabled, the current value of the channel is outside the range of the channel function. If the slider is completely disabled, its ModeMaster needs to be set appropriately.

Quitting GlowDTF

• On the main screen, click the "Close" Button in the upper right corner. All added Fixture Types and Fixtures will be lost.

Unimplemented Features

As GlowDTF focuses on rudimentary DMX control, there are many things in GDTF that are not supported:

• Channel Sets and Physical Values
• Wheels
• Color Management
• 3D Models
• Kinematic Geometry Chains
• Protocols other than DMX over Art-Net
• ...

GDTF Resources

• GDTF Share - Offical Website for GDTF. Database contains many GDTF files for download after registration and the Builder allows you to create your own GDTF files.
• GDTF Forum - Official Forum. Best place to ask questions regarding GDTF.
• DIN SPEC 15800:2020-07 - Standard document, free download with registration.
• mvrdevelopment/spec - Repository for GDTF Development. If you find an issue with the standard document (or the Builder?), open an issue here. You can also find the XML Schema here.
• GDTF Wiki - This Wiki on the official GDTF site has an up-to-date main page. Older pages from GDTF 1.0 days can still be found with the search. They sometimes contain background info that you won't find anywhere else.
  Note that the library for parsing GDTF and MVR mentioned here is currently available only upon request and I don't know about its licensing.

Developer Documentation

Information on how to build and develop can be found in the CONTRIBUTING.md. Additional in-depth notes on the design are in the folder /dev-docs.