Abstract
Nowadays, most of the automatized measurement processes are carried out by VISA (Virtual Instrument Software Architecture) compatible instruments, that execute the instructions provided by a host computer connected through wired standard buses, as USB (Universal Serial Bus), GPIB (General-Purpose Instrumentation Bus), PXI (PCI eXtensions for Instrumentation) or Ethernet. To overcome the intrinsic limitations associated to these wired systems, this work presents an instrumentation control system based on the IEEE 802.11 wireless communications standard. Intended for instruments having a USB control port, this port is connected to a gateway based on a compact Raspberry Single Board Computer (SBC) and thus the instrument can be connected to the host computer via Wireless Fidelity (WiFi), easily allowing the deployment of an ad-hoc instruments communication network in the working area or its connection to a previously deployed general purpose WiFi network. Developed under Python, the operation commands, wireless link protocol, and USB connection allow two modes of operation to provide system flexibility: a live mode, where commands are sent individually from the host computer to the selected instrument; and a standalone mode, where a full measurement process can be entirely downloaded in the gateway to be autonomously executed on the instrumentation. The system performance in both operation modes, distance of operation, time latencies, and operating lifetime in battery operation have been characterized.
Highlights
Automatic measurement processes are mainly performed using wired-controlled instruments, via either specific instrumentation buses such as GPIB (General-Purpose Instrumentation Bus) or PXI (PCI eXtensions for Instrumentation), or general-purpose communication buses such as USB (Universal Serial Bus) or Ethernet
It is of interest to have a wireless instrumentation control system that improves the flexibility of the measurement system configuration, facilitating the relocation of the instrumentation deployed in large areas, while being able to manage the measurement system in the same way as using traditional wire-based instrumentation control, as it is done in other RF applications: for instance, VOLUME XX, 2021
Unlike the case of live mode, where additional information related to the RF host-gateway connection must be included in the measurement commands sent from the host, the functions used to control the instrumentation in standalone mode are those included in the pyvisa package, all included in the previously downloaded local program
Summary
Automatic measurement processes are mainly performed using wired-controlled instruments, via either specific instrumentation buses such as GPIB (General-Purpose Instrumentation Bus) or PXI (PCI eXtensions for Instrumentation), or general-purpose communication buses such as USB (Universal Serial Bus) or Ethernet. Following the goal of a wireless control system for general laboratory instrumentation, some instrument manufacturers have introduced their own implementation, as the Agilent E5810B gateway [11], that connected to a WiFi Access-Point (AP) enables the wireless control of GPIB, RS-232, and USB instrumentation; or the Tektronix TekCloud [12], a cloud-based solution that allows a real-time remote oscilloscope control. In [14], [15], a more general interface is described, in which the RS232, GPIB, and USB buses are emulated using the IEEE 802.15.1 standard This solution supports a variety of buses, allowing to control any type of instrument in practice at a reduced cost. There is a release of the open-source code developed in this work
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