Ok, thanks for V4.x firmware, countofelements is included.  Good to know.  I have yet to update to V13 SP1 to take advantage of all the enhancements.

Ladja

Hi  huggy_d1,

thank you for your answers and code above. But I must say that CountOfElement isn't only for S7-1500. I have even worked with that in S7-1200 but you have to have the newest CPU like 1AG40.

Regards

L

Answer can be found here: ATTR_DB available in TIA V14 SP1? - Entries - Forum - Industry Support - Siemens 

Nicolas P.

 Hi 0_Einstein,

I assume that there must be a good reason, and that's why I am curious and would like to ask you :
Instead of the code that you have provided, why don't we use the instruction ATTR_DB to get the size of a DB ?

0_Einstein

This is SCL code that works for finding the size of a DB.  Perhaps you can adjust it to work with just the array.  Works with S7-1200 on V13 with FW 3.0/4.0/4.1

Cimant

I wonder: is it possible, with the instruction mentioned, to get the size of the array inside the FB?

I have an FB (see picture)

In this case FB31. I have an array declared inside FB
I would like to know the size of it.

I can do it with constants, but I'd like to know if I can retrieve this information with the instructions above mentioned

There is no direct solution. But workarounds exists.

[OPTION 1] Use the SERIALIZE instruction to give a size. The downside is that you will need an ARRAY OF BYTE as temporary buffer. And the process is process intensive.

[OPTION 2] Create a code block that uses ARRAY[*} as detailed earlier. Negative: You need to create a new code block and call it in the FB. (Is it really a problem?) 

[OPTION 3] Have the size point to a constant. Assume #SIZE as INT assigned to 300 in the CONST parameters. Then the array will be defined "Array [1..#SIZE] of..". This #SIZE can then be used within the code block.

You can enable array bounds error checking, and enable error handling inside the FB (or FC).

Then iterate over the array to find the upper bounds.

The upper bounds will be one less than the current array index when the out of bounds error is generated - allowing you test using get error functionality.

I use the same technique to find the current size of a DB using PEEK(...).

I would of course prefer NOT to generate an error.

I think a better approach would be to pass the bounds from the calling block.

Use LOWER and UPPER BOUNDS instructions as shown earlier in the replies on the array, and pass the results to the FB/FC using the array.

Cimant

I wonder: is it possible, with the instruction mentioned, to get the size of the array inside the FB?

I have an FB (see picture)

In this case FB31. I have an array declared inside FB
I would like to know the size of it.

I can do it with constants, but I'd like to know if I can retrieve this information with the instructions above mentioned