Version 1.0
Thursday, September 19, 2019
The PMKS file format is for use in applications that utilize the Planar Mechanism Kinematic Simulation library, PlanarMechanismKinematicSimulator.dll. Using this extension, files would appear in user accessible directories with names like, "fourbar.pmks". This file format is intended to provide a super-set of inputs that are available in the URL or TXT format employed previously (before August 2019). These formats should be maintained for backwards compatibility and URLs. The new value-based format is to capture all information to recreate: 1) the topology and parameters of the mechanism necessary to recreate the kinematics, 2) the additional information needed for additional simulations (e.g. static, dynamic, and stress), 3) the simulation settings, and 4) the visual elements. Of these four, the first is the only that is necessary. Necessary values are marked with an asterisk ("*") in the following tables.
The PMKS file format is a version of the JSON format (https://www.json.org/); however, the file extension is changed to .PMKS to facilitate automatically opening the file in native applications. In the future, the PMKS file may be a zip file in which it would include a JSON file with the connectivity described in this document as well as folders and files for other relevant information such as SVG shapes, input profiles, or images.
As an initial example, consider the simple four-bar shown in Figure 1. This is represented as a TXT as shown in Figure 2 and as the PMKS file in . The example is intended to provide a quick guide in how the properties of the file are defined.
Original document: Draft 9/1/2019, approved 9/9/2019 Authors: Matt Campbell
Revision 1: Approved ??/??/?? Authors: ???