# Adhoc trend Pen Control Data Columns

**URL:** <https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/adhoc-trend-pen-control-data-columns/84541>\
**Category:** Ignition\
**Tags:** perspective, vision\
**Created:** [January 21, 2024, 8:42pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/adhoc-trend-pen-control-data-columns/84541 "2024-01-21T20:42:03Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![hive121](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/90ced4/32.png) [@hive121](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/hive121)\
**Post date:** [January 21, 2024, 8:42pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/adhoc-trend-pen-control-data-columns/84541/1 "2024-01-21T20:42:03Z")

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Hello,

I am using the adhoc trending tool which is on Ignition Exchange. I would like to add a column to the pen Control which shows a description of the tag which is being plotted.

For Example:  
I want to show the documentation meta data for the tag which shown in tag editor below on the pen control table:

 ![image](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/inductiveautomation/original/3X/5/e/5e32aeee3d77f1f4804e24722c4c66be21da82dd.png)

This is what I mean by the pen control table:

 ![image](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/inductiveautomation/original/3X/5/6/564d5e3f14c154e9162180f01a773254da69cd83.png)

It seems that I have to add it to the penControl property under dataColumns which is associated to the powerChart:  
 ![image](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/inductiveautomation/original/3X/2/6/26b257387484d784af621d0ae0812bb7903f1be3.png)

However, when I add anything under the property, I get the following error:  
dataCoulmns.penControl.documentation: is not defined in the schema and additional properties are not allowed.

FYI: i called the added property "documentation"

Has anyone been able to achieve this?

I have done this in the vision Adhoc trend but cannot do it on perspective.

Thanks for your time and help.

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**Author:** ![djs](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e47774/32.png) [@djs](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/djs)\
**Post date:** [January 22, 2024, 4:17pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/adhoc-trend-pen-control-data-columns/84541/2 "2024-01-22T16:17:23Z")

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Seems like adding additional columns to the table is not supported.

We built a custom tag browser to add pens to the chart, and construct the _pen name_ in the script that appends a new pen to the pens prop. In your case you would read the tag description to get the pen name.

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**Author:** ![hive121](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/90ced4/32.png) [@hive121](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/hive121)\
**Post date:** [January 25, 2024, 1:45am UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/adhoc-trend-pen-control-data-columns/84541/3 "2024-01-25T01:45:09Z")

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Thank you  
I am assuming you used the powerChart component but set the visibility property "showTagBrowserButton" to false. Then, you added a "Tag Browse Tree" component on the screen and used a button to add the pens to the chart. What is the command you used to add pens to the chart?

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![djs](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e47774/32.png) [@djs](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/djs)\
**Post date:** [January 26, 2024, 4:15pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/adhoc-trend-pen-control-data-columns/84541/4 "2024-01-26T16:15:45Z")

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> [@hive121](#):
>
> I am assuming you used the powerChart component but set the visibility property "showTagBrowserButton" to false. Then, you added a "Tag Browse Tree" component on the screen and used a button to add the pens to the chart.

That is correct.

For adding pens to the power chart, we did something along these lines: `pens.append(newPen)`, where `pens` is the _pens_ property on the powerchart, and `newPen` is a dictionary.

If you right-click on on an existing pen in the properties on the powerchart and copy it, you can then paste it into a script as a dictionary and modify it from there. You'll have to construct the historical path for it to work with the historian:  
 ![image](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/inductiveautomation/original/3X/9/b/9b970f716f2116f4999bccf54218a74fb535fd7e.png)

You can then give the pen whatever name you want:  
 ![image](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/inductiveautomation/original/3X/3/4/34a12dced199be097832b54008c579c9971d1312.png)

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![hive121](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/90ced4/32.png) [@hive121](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/hive121)\
**Post date:** [January 28, 2024, 10:56pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/adhoc-trend-pen-control-data-columns/84541/5 "2024-01-28T22:56:27Z")

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thank you @djs will try it out