Ask an assistant about a fixture

Once an assistant is connected (see Connect an AI assistant), ask it about your fixtures in plain words. It works from what the bench measures and saves, not from guesses about the model.

What it can read

Everything the bench has saved on this computer, whether RDMBench is open or not:

• Reports: every fixture’s reports, from today and from earlier visits, and what changed between any two.
• Monitor sessions, with their events and summaries.
• A unit’s history: every visit, what changed each time, the faults that keep coming back, and the repair notes filed against it (see Fixture → Finish Repair…).
• The desk’s name for the mode a fixture is in, from the bench’s GDTF files (see Find a fixture’s desk mode).
• Settings templates: what every unit of a model should be set to.
• This help, so it can point you to the right page.

What it can do on the line

While RDMBench is open and connected to the line, the assistant works through the app:

• Scan one fixture, the ones new to the bench, or the whole line, and read the fresh reports. The fixtures it scans appear in the sidebar as if you had scanned them.
• Watch a fixture, or the whole line, over a stretch of time, for a fault that comes and goes. The Monitor tab says An assistant is watching while it does (see When an assistant is watching).
• Load test a fixture: drive it and read its sensors under output. It is told to check with you before driving a unit you have not just asked about, and it refuses while you are sending DMX or monitoring yourself (see Asking an assistant).

It cannot change a fixture’s settings: no address, personality or label changes, and it does not apply templates. Those stay with you, in the app or on the command line.

With RDMBench closed or not connected, it can still answer from what is saved, and says so rather than scanning.

What to ask

• “What’s wrong with the last fixture I scanned?”
• “Why would this fixture show the wrong colors?”
• “What did we do to this unit last time it was here?”
• “Has anything changed since its last visit?”
• “Which fixture on the line keeps dropping out? Watch it for five minutes.”
• “What mode should the desk be patched in for this one?”
• “Load test this fixture and tell me which modules don’t draw current.”

Check what it tells you against the report. It reads the same numbers you do, and can still misread them.