Lab 5 Serial Poll Bytes - Device Status
I. Objective:
To give the student a lesson in the use of serial poll bytes and how to control use
serial poll bytes and Device status to monitor instrument events and status.
II. Procedure:
In this lab, you will monitor the status of the Lock-in Amplifier and
report the status to the User using a VI. The VI must
- Monitor the Status byte and display this information on the VI front panel as a series
of LED lights. You are REQUIRED to use either an ARRAY or CLUSTER data format for the status byte.
- As a separate monitor, display a boolean indicator (LED is fine) which indicates if the
Lockin is overloaded or unlocked. (For LOCK-IN operation, these are the most important
status conditions.)
- In your implementation of the reading of the status, think about how often
and where in the VI's logic sequence you should check the status of the
instrument. Clearly, checking it too often slows down the VI execution while
not checking it often enough may result in missing a critical instrument
error.
Additional information and a copy of this lab is located at:
http://web.njit.edu/~gnita/VI/OPSE310/OPSE310lab_5.htm
Submit the created VI or VIs by attaching them to an e-mail document
that contains the answers to the discussion questions below. (Note that you can either
attach the VI or zip the VIs by using WinZIP). E-mail the answers to the discussion
questions and the VI or VIs to:
gnita@njit.edu
III. Discussion:
- In a more sophisticated version of this lab, if an OVERLOAD status condition is detected
by the VI, what action should the VI take? Eg. warn the user? Change the sensitivity
settings? Change the time constants?
- In this lab, you were required to use an ARRAY or CLUSTER data structure for the status byte. Is
there an advantage to using this data structure for the status byte rather than using 8
separate boolean structures?