Does anyone know if it’s possible to access the total number of iterations, specified during setup, within a process? I know there is the current iteration variable but so far have found no way of accessing the total number of iterations. This seems like something that would be very useful to have so I’m surprised Tecan have not added this as an easily accessible variable (unless I’m missing something obvious!)
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Isn’t that just a function that just a function that you can call?
It may not return total iterations, maybe just current.
Also does the variable view window now reflect a number?
No, there is only the “ProcessIteration()” function you can just call but no easy way to get total iterations
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Any chance that’s an array and you could find the length?
In case you have already thought of it, sorry.
But running your script x times as a module and creating your own iteration variable might be a better bet.
Modules are a lot more flexible, I don’t know if this puts other restrictions or if you will have to refacture.
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Yeah I think it could work and I use some modules as they work nicely for some aspects of scripting. It’s just that modules wouldn’t work with the scheduler for multiple process iterations to dynamically restructure the resources (I think).
@evwolfson I have looked into it but the processIteration() is a built in function that only returns 1 integer and doesn’t receive any arguments.
This is all that the help menu gives: “FluentControl contains a function called ProcessIteration() which returns the current iteration number of this Process. Imagine it being similar like a loop counter but counting Process iterations instead. When you assign the result of this function to a variable you can use it for programming.”
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I was going to ask what’s the use case for process iterations outside of the scheduler but it does seem like you’re using the scheduler
At that point just make it a subroutine in a script. I haven’t found module too useful yet.
Edit: unless you have found them useful…
I tried to parse the Log Viewer file to locate the variable but then I had to run to meetings. This is a good feature request for future versions of Fluent control. @bhastings you should consider submitting the consideration to help desk.
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@bhastings : What would be the use case for getting the number of total iterations? How would you use the value? within the process? within another process? hand it over to subsequently performed script/task? Can you please elaborate a little further on your needs?
Mainly it would be useful to know at the start of walk away automation how many iterations were planned and then check that there was enough resources on deck (or in accessible storage) to complete a time critical run without running out of tips, buffers, reagents, plates etc when running overnight processes with scheduler.