Offline editing software is a terrific way to advance program parts of your show, edit an existing show file or just get familiar with a lighting control system. Offline editing tools are available for all ETC consoles.

Ion Offline, which can be run on any PC using the Windows® XP operating system (Mac native compatibility is coming soon!) provides an operating environment and graphic displays identical to the console itself. The complete set of alphanumeric-keyboard shortcuts and virtual controls for all front panel commands and operations are exactly the same as those used for the Ion Client.

Ion Offline can also communicate with visualization programs. Communication with the visualizer is provided over an Ethernet network and can use either the ETCNet2 or Net3 protocols. It’s important to note that output from Ion Offline is done with an infrequent refresh rate; as such, a simulated fade on Offline to a visualizer will appear with visible steps, which would not occur in the real world.

Because working quickly is important to you – and it can be hard to remember all of those keyboard shortcuts, we recommend the use of PI Engineering's X-Keys® panel with Ion Client software. X-Keys are a panel of user-definable keys. We have provided a file that defines the X-Keys Professional 58-key panel with the Ion hotkey shortcuts most used in remote programming and editing.