Procedure for using the Break step, Condition step, and Continue step


The Break step, Condition step, and Continue step control the flow of the project by evaluating a user-defined conditon statement; the next step executed in the project will depend on whether the statement has been evaluated as true or false.

For the Break step, if the conditon statement is evaluated as true, the flow will break out of the current loop and go to the following step.

For the Condition step, if the conditon statement is evaluated as true, the steps on the right branch will be executed next.

For the Continue step, if the conditon statement is evaluated as true, all the following steps will be bypassed and the first step in the current loop will be executed next.

The condition statement can be defined in the Simple editor, the Link editor or the Advanced editor. To express a condition statement using the Simple editor, do the following:

  1. Choose the property you want to evaluate in the condition statement. A property can be chosen by expanding the list of steps shown in the Configuration pane; properties will appear under the heading of their associated step. You can change the list to show either input properties or output properties by clicking on the In or Out button, left of the Configuration pane.

  2. The property chosen must be from a step which occurs in the flowchart prior to the current step.

  3. Select an operator which will compare the property to the user-defined value. The list of possible operators will change according to the property chosen.

  4. Specify the value to which the property will be compared. For properties with defined values, a list of values to select from will appear. For example, for the EdgeLocator.Status property, only a value of Pass or Fail can be selected.

The Link editor allows you to link to properties from other steps that only have true or false values, for example, the Metrology.HasTimedOut property, without defining a condition statement. If this property is set to true, the project's flow will proceed as if the condition statement was evaluated as true, and vice versa.

The condition statement can also be defined using the Advanced editor by following the procedure outlined above for the Simple editor. In the Advanced editor, the condition statement is defined in the text box and can be more complex than the one defined in the Simple editor. The properties and operators are chosen from the available lists; if a property has defined values, they will appear in a box to the right of the list when the property is selected. For more information on using the Advanced editor, see the Using the Advanced editor subsection of the Configuration pane and editors section in the Panes and editors reference chapter.