attach a label or properties to a connection point?

[Leeoniya]

i'm not sure how this has been overlooked in probably the most widely used network diagramming tool in the world.

is there no built-in way to attach/assign things like IP and MAC addresses to connection points? preferably as searchable/sortable/customizable attribute fields rather than a just a text box, but a text box would be a start at least.

is there any way with VBA to make this happen?

thanks,
Leon

[Visio Guy]

Hi Leon,

Connection points don't have any built-in data structures that you can exploit.

You can, however, name connection point rows in the ShapeSheet.

Add Shape Data (Custom Property) fields to shapes. This data could be associated with the CPs by a system of your devise.

Same with User-defined cells or Scratch cells in the ShapeSheet.

Shapes can hold XML data, and you can write just about any kind of string-data into ShapeSheet cells. So there is plenty of flexibility, just nothing really built-in and ready to go.

[aledlund]

It's an interesting challange.

At it's most basic you should start out with how will an individual port be identified within an enterprise. The starting point of course is a unique name for the port and the component that it is a part of. The stumbling point here of course is that the component name is often not the same as the network name that at first blush would be assumed. Consider the issue of a large router (such as the Cisco 6500 series), with multiple ethernet cards and each having a possible 48 ports. The next issue comes with how much information you may need to keep track of. The IP address and Mac addresses may only be the start (speed, utilization, technology, connector type, wwwnid, etc.)

I use a two part name for a port that is based on the concept of "slots" and "ports". A "slot" is where a component may be plugged into. Examples : A router into a rack, a power supply / blade into switch, a blade into a chassis, a gbic into a switch. The key point here is that within visio almost all of these are handled as 1D shapes. So for a switch card being installed into a router's (rtrABC) first slot, the component name is rtrABC_1. I use the underscore as the delimiter. Slot connection points are explicitly defined by me in the master shapes as well. I found this out the hard way because all the vendor shapes don't necessarily start at point 1 and move incrementally (some vendor racks start at the bottom, others at the top). A slot obviously has two points (side 1 and side 2) and can be horizontal or vertical. I use point 1 as the left (or bottom) and side 2 as right (or top). Slot connection points then might be "slot_1_1"

For a port on the switch, the connection point is explicitly named port_X_Y, where X is a named port and Y is a technology. As an example port_cons_31 in my implementation is the console port and uses ethernet (31). This naming standard allows me to validate the shapes using vba for "slots" and "ports". Since my drawings are created from an external database, I can validate and datamine using standard tools.

The nice thing about this is that when you're analyzing cables with the shapesheet

=PAR(PNT(rtrABC_5!Connections.port_1_32.X,rtrABC_5!Connections.port_1_32.Y))

it becomes fairly straight forward.

Data schemas for this type of enterprise implementation can get complex.

al

ps Sorry for the long posting

[aledlund]

When working with collections and vba it is possible to lose sight of some of the things you might be able to do. This demo code shows how a vba user might build and save collections in a visio shapesheet cell as a complex string.
Have fun,
al

Code

Option Explicit

Public Sub demoStringStuff()
    
    Dim strIn As String
    Dim strOut As String
    Dim colA As collection
    Set colA = New collection
    Dim colB As collection
    Set colB = New collection
    Dim colC As collection
    Set colC = New collection

    With colA
        .Add "CompA"
        .Add "PortA"
        .Add "127.0.0.1"
        .Add "0123456789ab"
    End With
    
    strIn = BuildCsvString(colA)

    MsgBox strIn
    
    Set colB = BuildCsvCollection(strIn)
    strOut = ""
        strOut = strOut & colB.Item(1) & "= component" & vbCrLf
        strOut = strOut & colB.Item(2) & "= port" & vbCrLf
        strOut = strOut & colB.Item(3) & "= ipaddr" & vbCrLf
        strOut = strOut & colB.Item(4) & "= macaddr" & vbCrLf
    MsgBox strOut
    
    Dim intX As Integer
    intX = ParseItemsToCollection(colB.Item(3), colC, ".", "integer")
    strOut = "IpAddress " & vbCrLf
        strOut = strOut & colC.Item(1) & " first byte" & vbCrLf
        strOut = strOut & colC.Item(2) & " second byte " & vbCrLf
        strOut = strOut & colC.Item(3) & " third byte " & vbCrLf
        strOut = strOut & colC.Item(4) & " final byte " & vbCrLf
    MsgBox strOut
    
    
    Dim blnTrueFalse As Boolean
    blnTrueFalse = memberStringOfCollection(colB, "127.0.0.1")
    If blnTrueFalse = True Then
        MsgBox "We found a loopback address"
    Else
        MsgBox "loopback not in use"
    End If
    
    
End Sub





'***************************************************************************
'
'   simple collection handlers
'
'***************************************************************************

'
' test for case neutral member
'
Private Function memberStringOfCollection _
            (ByVal colStrings As collection, _
            ByVal strMember As String) _
            As Boolean
    Dim intX As Integer
    Dim blnReturn As Boolean
    blnReturn = False
    
    For intX = 1 To colStrings.Count
        If LCase(strMember) = LCase(colStrings.Item(intX)) Then
            blnReturn = True
            GoTo ExitHandler
        End If
    Next intX


ExitHandler:
    memberStringOfCollection = blnReturn

End Function

'
'
'
Private Sub removeStringFromCollection _
        (ByRef colStrings As collection, _
        ByVal strRemove As String)

    Dim intX As Integer
    For intX = colStrings.Count To 1 Step -1
        If LCase(colStrings.Item(intX)) = LCase(strRemove) Then
            colStrings.Remove intX
        End If
    Next intX
    Exit Sub
ErrHandler:
    Debug.Print "removestringfromcollection " & Err.Description
End Sub


'
'
'
Private Sub addStringToCollection _
        (ByRef colStrings As collection, _
        ByVal strNew As String, _
        Optional ByVal blnUnique As Boolean = True)
        
    Dim intX As Integer
    Dim blnFound As Boolean
    blnFound = False
    
    '
    ' blnUnique ensures that the result is a list of unique names
    '
    If blnUnique = True Then
        For intX = 1 To colStrings.Count
            If colStrings.Item(intX) = strNew Then
                blnFound = True
                GoTo Found
            End If
        Next intX
    End If
     
Found:
    If blnFound = False Then
        colStrings.Add strNew
    End If

End Sub




Private Function ParseItemsToCollection _
    (ByVal s As String, _
    ByRef colA As collection, _
    ByVal Delim As String, _
    Optional ByVal strType As String = "string") _
    As Integer

'
Dim p As Long
Dim I As Long
'
' Check for valid delimiter
'
  If Delim = "" Then
    ParseItemsToCollection = -1
    Exit Function
  End If


'
' Copy Items
'
  p = InStr(1, s, Delim, vbTextCompare)
  Do While p > 0
  
    Select Case strType
        Case "string"
            colA.Add Left$(s, p - 1)
        Case "integer"
            colA.Add CInt(Left$(s, p - 1))
        Case "double"
            colA.Add CDbl(Left$(s, p - 1))
        Case "long"
            colA.Add CLng(Left$(s, p - 1))
    End Select
    s = Mid$(s, p + 1)
    p = InStr(1, s, Delim, vbTextCompare)
  Loop
'
' Copy Last Item
'
    Select Case strType
        Case "string"
            colA.Add s
        Case "integer"
            colA.Add CInt(s)
        Case "double"
            colA.Add CDbl(s)
        Case "long"
            colA.Add CLng(s)
    End Select
'
  ParseItemsToCollection = colA.Count
    Exit Function
    
ErrHandler:
  
    Debug.Print "ParseItemsToCollection " & Err.Description
    ParseItemsToCollection = colA.Count
  
End Function


'
' create a csv string with end brackets from a collection
'
Private Function BuildCsvString _
    (ByVal colA As collection) _
    As String

    Dim intX As Integer
    Dim intY As Integer
    On Error GoTo ErrHandler
    Dim strCsv As String
    strCsv = ""
    
    If (colA Is Nothing) _
        Or (colA.Count = 0) Then
        strCsv = "[]"
        GoTo ExitHandler
    End If
    
    If colA.Count = 1 Then
        strCsv = "[" & CStr(colA.Item(1)) & "]"
        GoTo ExitHandler
    End If
    
    With colA
        ' start bracket
        strCsv = "["
        For intY = 1 To colA.Count
            strCsv = strCsv & CStr(colA.Item(intY))
            If intY <> colA.Count Then
                strCsv = strCsv & ","
            End If ' test for last position
        Next intY
        ' end bracket
        strCsv = strCsv & "]"
    End With
    
ExitHandler:
    BuildCsvString = strCsv
    Exit Function
    
ErrHandler:
    BuildCsvString = strCsv
    Debug.Print "BuildCsvString " & Err.Description

End Function


'
' pass in a bracketed string of csv separated items and pass back a collection
' strType allows the user to define what the collection is composed of
'
Private Function BuildCsvCollection _
        (ByVal strCsv As String, _
        Optional ByVal strType As String = "string") _
        As collection

    On Error GoTo ErrHandler
    
    Dim colReturn As collection
    Set colReturn = New collection
    
    Dim intX As Integer
    
    ' get rid of first bracket
    If InStr(1, strCsv, "[") Then
        strCsv = Replace(strCsv, "[", "")
    Else
        GoTo ExitHandler
    End If
    ' get rid of second bracket
    If InStr(1, strCsv, "]") Then
        strCsv = Replace(strCsv, "]", "")
    Else
        GoTo ExitHandler
    End If
    
    intX = ParseItemsToCollection(strCsv, colReturn, ",", strType)
    
ExitHandler:
    Set BuildCsvCollection = colReturn
    Exit Function
    
ErrHandler:
    Set BuildCsvCollection = colReturn
    Debug.Print "BuildCsvCollection " & Err.Description
    
End Function