Possibility of naming the blocks automatically

Hi Community,

1. Is there any possibility of naming the blocks automatically with custom format whenever a new block is added inside the simulink canvas.
2. Using the Edit time checks can we make the type of violation as information instead for warning.

Answer 1

[Samay Sagar]

Blocks in Simulink can be renamed automatically by setting up an event listener in MATLAB that triggers a function to rename the block every time a new one is added using "set_param" function .

The code below shows the steps to set up an event listener that appends a custom prefix to the name of each new block added to the Simulink canvas.

function renameBlock(block)
    % Validate the block handle
    if isempty(block) || ~ishandle(block) || ~strcmp(get_param(block, 'Type'), 'block')
      
        return;
    end
    
    % Get the original block name
    originalName = get_param(block, 'Name');
    
    % Define the custom prefix
    customPrefix = 'Custom_';
    
    % Append the custom prefix if it's not already there
    if ~startsWith(originalName, customPrefix)
        newName = [customPrefix, originalName];
        set_param(block, 'Name', newName);
    end
end

function setupBlockAddListener(modelName)
    % Ensure the model is open
    load_system(modelName);

    % Add a listener for block addition events
    listener = addlistener(get_param(modelName, 'Object'), 'ObjectChildAdded', @(s,e)renameBlock(e.Child));

    % Store the listener in the base workspace to keep it alive
    assignin('base', 'myBlockAddListener', listener);
end

You can read more about “get_param” and “set_param” here:

https://www.mathworks.com/help/releases/R2023a/simulink/slref/get_param.html

https://www.mathworks.com/help/releases/R2023a/simulink/slref/set_param.html

Please note the following:

• Make sure the “setupBlockAddListener” function is called after opening the model and before adding any blocks to ensure that all new blocks are captured by the listener.
• The listener is stored in the base workspace to keep it active. If you close MATLAB, you will need to run the “setupBlockAddListener” function again when you reopen MATLAB and your model.

Lastly, to address the severity level of edit-time checks, you can follow the documentation available here :

https://www.mathworks.com/help/releases/R2023a/slcheck/ref/modeladvisor.edittimecheck-class.html