This document explains some basic programmer tabs, and ideas on how to use them:
A roster is a database of all locomotives that your installation of DecoderPro has programmed. It includes the information seen in the screen below:
When the entry is first created, this ID field will contain "<new entry>". The program will insist you change that before you first save the entry.
You can change this at any time later, just remember to save the entry to make the new ID permanent.
The Save button stores the current decoder information to your Roster folder. The default storage is in the same directory the Preferences are stored in.
The "Reset to Defaults" button, not a "factory reset", returns the Decoder CVs to the Default value that was programmed into the decoder xml file. It does NOT change the values in the roster file on your hard disk, unless you Save it The Values are not written to the decoder until you select a to write them.
Most decoders will activate the Reset Menu (next to the File menu at the top of the page). This is the "Factory Reset", some of the manufacturer has several reset routines. It does this by writing directly to a CV in the decoder, CV8 in the case of Digitrax. All decoders may not support Factory Rest and how they work is manufacturer and decoder dependent.
The Basic pane is where you set the Decoder address, you can set the short and the long address and then select which one is Active.
The items that displayed may be different for each decoder. It depends on how the decoder definition file was written and what options the manufacture included in the decoder.
You can select the Locomotive Direction. If you want the loco to go in the other direction set Reverse.
The Speed Steps for the Loco can be selected, usually its 28 steps.
You can select wither the loco responds to DV voltage or not.
You can enter any number you want into the "User id's"
The Manufacture ID and the Manufacture Version ID are set in the decoder by the Manufacture. JMRI uses these to identify the decoder.
The other tabs are dependent on what the manufacture installed in the decoder, if the options were not installed the panes are either gray or not enabled.
This panel may look different depending on how the decoder xml was built. To use the Speed Table CV's usually the basic speed option needs to be turned off. The little boxes under each slider are very useful. To see how they work check one in the middle of the table then slide the last slider down. Notice that the values do not change below the one you checked. They also do not change for steps above if a lower step is changed.