The check boxes related to the Positive Reporting area control the reporting of features to the negative side of the origin. With positive reporting, features that would normally have negative values are always printed with positive values.
The X, Y, and Z check boxes determine on which axis (or axes) PC-DMIS will display positive numbers.
The All Data option tells PC-DMIS to flip the measured and nominal values of the selected axis (or axes) and to display any negative numbers for nominal axes as positive numbers.
The Deviations Only option tells PC-DMIS to flip only the deviations of the selected axis (or axes) when the nominal values of axes are negative numbers.
When these check boxes are selected, a POSITIVEREPORTING command is inserted into the measurement routine at the current cursor position. This command has the following format in the Edit window:
POSITIVEREPORTING/ a, b, c, TOG1
Where:
a = X when the X check box is selected, or blank if the X check box is cleared.
b = Y when the Y check box is selected, or blank if the Y check box is cleared.
c = Z when the Z check box is selected, or blank if the Z check box is cleared.
TOG1 = ALLDATA or DEVONLY depending on whether you selected the All Data or Deviations Only option.
The X, Y, and Z direction may each have positive reporting turned on in any combination of the three. Multiple POSITIVEREPORTING commands may be used within the same measurement routine, and any dimensions that are in the measurement routine are displayed using the POSITIVEREPORTING command that precedes the dimensions. If no POSITIVEREPORTING command exists in the measurement routine, all dimensions are reported with the options turned OFF in the X, Y, and Z directions.
The following diagram demonstrates how the tolerances are also affected by the positive reporting options:
Positive Reporting affecting tolerances
A = 0.3 +tol in X
B = 0.1 -tol in X
C = 0.2 deviation in X
D = Point 1
E = Point 2
F = 1.0 nominal
Purpose of Positive Reporting
Positive reporting allows you to report features in a symmetric manner, so that, regardless of which side of the origin the feature exists, deviations away from the origin are considered positive, and deviations toward the origin are considered negative.
Thus, in the diagram above, both Point1 and Point2 will display positive deviations when positive reporting in the X axis. This also means, however, that:
plus tolerances are applied away from the origin.
minus tolerances are applied toward the origin.
Migrating Older Measurement Routines
When migrating measurement routines from an older version of PC-DMIS (such as 3.7) to version 4.x or higher, you may have a problem with the tolerance band being flipped when using Positive Reporting in your dimensions and you are using variables to insert the tolerance values into the PLUS and MINUS tol fields. The UseLegacyPositiveReporting entry, located in the Option section of the PC-DMIS Settings Editor, lets you use the legacy positive reporting in these cases, making it so that the tolerance values are not flipped.