Change component size in system composer

How can I change a component size in MATLAB system composer by means of APIs (command line or MATLAB code) ?

Answer 1

[Josh Kahn]

Hi Aidin,

You can use System Composer native APIs for this to interact with your architecture model in an object-oriented manner:

architectureModel = systemcomposer.loadModel('MyArchitecture');
myComponent = lookup(architectureModel, Path='MyArchitecture/MyComponent')
myComponent.Position = [100 100 100 100]

For more information on components, you can reference the following doc page:

https://www.mathworks.com/help/systemcomposer/ref/systemcomposer.arch.component.html

Regards,

Josh

[Luca Ferro]

What are the advantages of using the system composer library over the standard simulink one to use system composer programmatically ?

Just asking out of curiosity because i cannot access most of the system composer library functions code since it's protected

[Josh Kahn]

Hi Luca,

That's a great question! There are multiple advantages to using the native APIs:

1. Object-Oriented interaction with your architecture model
2. The ability to take advantage of architecture modeling features not available in Simulink such as Stereotypes, Interfaces, Parameters, Views, Allocations, and Sequence Diagrams
3. The APIs are designed for System Composer so you won't run into nuisance errors trying to do something using the Simulink APIs that isn't supported in System Composer

You can find the full list of System Composer APIs on this documentation page:

https://www.mathworks.com/help/systemcomposer/referencelist.html

Hope this helps,

Josh

[Luca Ferro]

thank you for your reply. I'll nosedive into the docs you just shared. I see a lot of potential in this library, the second point sold it to me.

Answer 2

[Luca Ferro]

via script:

scTmpArc=open_system('scTmpArc') %sxTmpArc is the name of your system composer file

set_param('scTmpArc/.../..',position',[100 400 500 500]) %the first paramter is the fullpath to your block

The numbers are the dimensions in pixel [x0 y0 x1 y1] meaning that x1-x0 is the lenght, y1-y0 is the height

if you don't know the fullpath you can search for it by doing:

cmpNames=getfullname(Simulink.findBlocks('scTmpArc')) %this will list every component path in cell arrays

you can then parse the cell array to find the name you need (also via script or by hand)

Note: keep in mind that system composer is just a simulink interface from a scripting point of view. Basically all the simulink commands work for both.