Locations Details

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Normal or blocklist selection.
See: Location prioritization

The flow management of a location controls outgoing trains and is very well suited to manage hidden yards: The minimal occupancy grants the yard remains partly filled while the Fifo option allows the trains to exit alternately.

• It has to be ensured the trains have to stop in the location. The wait option of all blocks covered by the location has to be enabled (see Block General).
• The block type should be set to Others (see Block Details).
• The Mainline Block option must be disabled.
• All blocks must have the same orientation for some flow options.

The flow management is controlled by the following two parameters:

Setting this option to values greater than zero will activate the location flow of trains.
No train is allowed to depart if the number of trains is lower than this value.
Or with other words:
Only if the number of trains in the location is equal or greater than this value a train is allowed to exit the location.
If there are staging blocks in the location, all trains in staging blocks are counted.

With hidden stations this allows to control the amount of traffic on the layout: If in a hidden yard consisting of five tracks four trains are always to remain the value has to be set to five (a train is allowed to depart not until five trains are in the yard). Rule of thumb: Number of trains to remain in the yard plus one. The maximal reasonable value is equal to the number of tracks in the yard.

• If the minimal occupancy is not reached no train will depart from the location in auto mode even if, for instance, it is attempted to move the train by means of drag and drop. To move a train out of the location under this condition
  • either the train is (re) started (see below)
  • or the auto mode has to be switched off and the train has to be controlled manually, e. g. by means of a Rocrail throttle.

• With a train (re)Start command the minimal occupancy can be overwritten one time per (re)start command:
  • If the train is in auto mode already a single start command from the context menu will start it.
  • If the train is not in auto mode, the first start command will set it in auto mode and a second start command will allow it to depart.

• Schedules may be used together with flow management. However, the Time Processing of the respective schedule should be set to Relative as the flow management takes priority over the schedule's departure times.
• If a train has already received the exit permit, but has not yet left the block, it is no longer counted in the minimum occupation.
  If this is the only reason why the minimum occupation of the locality - apparently - would still be given, no other train can leave.

The "Minimal Occupied" value will be used if this option is set to zero, default, or the number of locomotives running in automatic mode is equal or greater than this option.

In conjunction with Minimal Occupied (see above) this option will allow departing trains to regard the "First In, First Out" rule.

• If the FIFO option is activated trains do depart in strict rotation.
  • This can only be overwritten with a train (re)Start command (see also Minimal Occupied above).
• All trains in this location must be in automatic mode to enable flow and to prevent a deadlock situation.
• After a restart the FIFO will be initialized; the order of entering before the restart is not preserved.
• There is no FIFO without a Minimal Occupied greater than zero.
  

If the top locomotive can not find a new destination it will be moved to the bottom of the FIFO after one or more retries.

A random "FIFO" sequence is created at the start of a Rocrail session.

Remark: The last locomotive arrival time, is taken into account if FIFO is set without random.
Remark: Thus the block sequence in the location no longer plays a role.

Only locomotives with an assigned train are allowed in this location.

See: Select shortest block
Note: The "Enable" checkbox must be set to activate this option.

A free block must be available in one of the partner locations to be able to depart. Without an entry the option is deactivated.
The CSV list can be modified by the three dot button on the right. The will open another Locations Dialog for selecting partners.

Set the maximal occupancy in the location if it needs some free blocks to move trains without deadlocking. A value of zero disables the maximal occupied option.
This option can be specified for both enter sides.
The Number of Commuter trains plus Others¹⁾ should be set equal to the total.

Maximal number of commuter trains in this location. (Independent of the enter side)

Maximal number of none commuter trains, others, in this location. (Independent of the enter side)

Maximal number of a type in this location. (Independent of the enter side)

• Absolute and hourly only.
• Destinations must be real blocks.
• The regular stops must have a depart time set.

Generate a timetable on the fly in RCP format. This is also for use with MQTT and Node-RED.
In case of actions the %callertext% variable will be set with plain ASCII or HTML.

Tip: See the User page of Gerrit for a Node-RED implementation. (DE)

Publish the timetable to all clients.
Rocview will automatically popup Timetable dialogs if wanted. (No actions needed.)

To reset the schedules to the last position and size shown, the option Restore dialog size must be activated.
If this does not happen after Rocrail has been restarted, (then one time only) the popup windows will have to be closed manually.

Format the timetable in HTML for actions.
The receiving text object should have the HTML option enabled.

• https://forum.rocrail.net/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=15238

See Actions for more details.

Action state: "scheduleupdate"

If a block is selected as sub state the first entry for this block from the timetable will be used to set the following text variables:

• %calleruserdata% = Depart time including delay.
• %callertext% = The via blocks and final destination.

Action state: "occupdate"

• %calleruserdata% = actual occupancy:minimal occupancy, like "2:0"
• %callertext% = The Fifo list of locos in this location.

Location 1 has Fifo active and minimal occupancy 3.
Location 2 has Fifo active and minimal occupancy 2.

• location-test.zip

Put Rocrail in automode and start all locos.

Location “Schattenbahnhof” has Fifo active, minimal occupancy 3, permission nothing chosen.
Location “Fernverkehr” has Fifo active, minimal occupancy 2, permission of type “Intercity”.
Location “Güterverkehr” has Fifo active, minimal occupancy 2, permission of type “Freight”.

• test_ortschaften.zip
  

"Ortschaft" = Location
Put Rocrail in automode and start all locos.

With the XMLScript command "info" an overview of a location can be set in a Text object.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<xmlscript>
  <location id="Blaak" cmd="info" svalue="tx1"/>
</xmlscript>

All loco's are checked if they have a schedule assigned, and the schedules will be scanned if blocks are in it for the selected location.

Depart time,Destination Location ID,Block ID,Train/Loco ID,Optional text|