VLCB/CBUS Module descriptor format & examples.
This format aims to provide a way to describe a module in a form that can be digested by a computer program to provide a meaningful user interface, without changing the software programming
Please see the latest Module Descriptor File Format document for detailed information.
The naming of the module descriptors follows the following format:
<module name>-<module identity>-<version>.json
Where the module identity is the combination of the manufacturer & module id in hex. And the version number is the major & minor number as reported by the module.
An example for the CANMIO module is CANMIO-A520-3d.json
Note that for development work, a manufacturer code of 13 is recommended (0x0D), allowing any module id to be used for an individuals own use.
This folder contains module descriptors that whilst are valid files, are likely to be incomplete, and not yet validated as complete.
See the Status page for information about current status for
each descriptor file and what work is left to complete them.
This folder is sub-divided as follows...
MERG modules have manufacturer ID MERG & module numbers assigned by them
Development modules use the manufacturer code '13' as assigned by NMRA to Public Domain & Do-It-Yourself Decoders, and the best choice for anyone initially developing a new module
It's free to use any module number, so allowing for multiple different projects, but it is the users responsibility to ensure the module number is suitable and won't conflict on their system.
So files here may need their module ID changed to suit
These are intended for 'in-house' testing, not for general use
This folder contains scripts for some modules that will generate a module descriptor file for the appropriate module.
A generator is useful where there is repeated information, e.g. the same content for channels 1 to 8, with tokens for simple substitution like variable number.
Please see the README in the generator folder for more information.
Before committing any changes you must set up Git hooks. See the specific README that describes this.
Module descriptor files contain a "timestamp" element that is used to check if a user provided descriptor file is older than a system descriptor file. It is important to update this "timestamp" element whenever a descriptor file is updated.
A Git hook is provided to automatically update the "timestamp" element when updates to descriptor files are committed. The README file above describes how this hook is set up.