Steps for setting up WinWedge:

1. Select "DDE Server" from WinWedge "Mode" menu. When the dialog box appears asking for a DDE Command Destination Application, enter: "QPW" as the Application Name and then enter "SYSTEM" as the DDE topic.

2. Select "Input Record Structure" in the "Define" menu and define the structure of the input record(s) to WinWedge. When you get to the final Window entitled "Input Record Definition Editor", enter the string: {Get_Wedge_Data} as the Field Postamble DDE Command after the last data field that you have defined. This is a DDE command that will be sent to Quattro Pro after each data record is received by the Wedge.

3. Set up the rest of WinWedge parameters and activate it.

Steps for setting up Quattro Pro:

Quattro Pro does not have a "Get_Wedge_Data" DDE command so the first step is to create one. When you create and name a macro in a Quattro Pro notebook, the name of the macro automatically becomes a valid Quattro Pro DDE command for as long as the notebook is open.

1. Enter the following lines into cells in a Quattro Pro notebook and name
    each cell or group of cells using the block names indicated below.

Block Name Block Contents

row 1
column A
cell_number A1
dde_channel 0
dde_command [beep]
result 0

get_wedge _data {ONERROR _error_handler}

{REQUEST dde_channel,"FIELD(1)",@@("cell_number")}
{LET row,row+1}
{LET cell_number,+column&@string(row,0)}
{EXECUTE dde_channel,+dde_command,result}

_error_handler {INITIATE "WinWedge","COM1",dde_channel}

This example sets up WinWedge to issue a DDE command to Quattro Pro consisting of the name of a macro (get_wedge_data) after each data record is received from your serial device. The macro performs a DDE Request to WinWedge that returns the contents of FIELD(1) to a spreadsheet cell pointed to by the variables named "row" and "column". (i.e. row 1, column A)

The blocks with the names "row", "column", "cell_number", "dde_channel", "dde_command" and "result" are simply variables that are used by the "get_wedge_data" macro. The "get_wedge_data" macro first sets up an error handler pointing to the macro named "_error_handler". The following line then attempts to request the data for "Field(1)" from WinWedge and store the data in a cell whose address is pointed to by the variable "cell_number". The first time the macro is invoked the "request" command will fail because a DDE channel has not yet been opened. The purpose of the "_error_handler" macro is to simply initiate the DDE channel when the first call to "get_wedge_data" fails. After the "request" macro command, the variable "row" is incremented and the variable "cell_number" is updated using the new row number so that it points to the cell directly below the one where the last data reading from WinWedge was stored. Thus, each time a new data record is received by WinWedge, the contents of "Field(1)" will be retrieved and stacked up in a column. The final macro line in the "get_wedge_data" macro uses Quattro Pro’s "Execute" command to issue a "Beep" command to WinWedge. This line has been included as an example of how to send DDE commands to WinWedge from Quattro Pro.