Das Hauptmenu, in dem man verschiedene Anwendungen starten
kann:
Online - Stream to display
Die "Schaltflächen" rechts unten bedeuten:
Der Rest wird vorerst nicht gebraucht
Die Schaltfläche links unten "Autoscale": mit ihr kann die Grafik komplett in das Fenster eingepasst werden.
Rechtsklick auf das graue Feld mit den Kurven öffnet ein Menu:
hier kann man wieder neu skalieren
 |
Zoomfunktion: "Zoom-In": mit der Maus einen Bereich auswählen, der dann vergrößert dargestellt wird "Zoom-Out": verkleinern |
wird nicht gebraucht,
die Kurve wird bei einer neuen Messung ersetzt
 |
Center Markers: hier werden zwei kleine Markierungspfeile(Dreiecke)
in der Bildmitte zentriert. Man kann sie mit der Maus verschieben. Ihre
X/Y- Werte werden unter der Grafik angegeben. Sie platzieren sich immer
direkt an einem der Messpunkte. So kann man genaue Messungen machen und
die Messwerte direkt ablesen. (X- und Y-Wert). |
 |
Durch Anklicken der beiden Felder ganz unten kann man wählen, ob die Marker für die rote oder schwarze Kurve gelten sollen |
 |
Hiermit kann man die aktuelle Grafik an den Standard-Drucker schicken.
Achtung: Diesen Drucker muss man zuerst unter Windows einrichten und als Standard-Drucker definieren. (to plot = drucken) |
Klick auf "A1"links der Grafik verändert die Liniendarstellung:
 |
Durch mehrfaches Durchklicken kommt man wieder zu der ersten Einstellung zurück. Den eventuell nicht benutzten Kanal kann man dadurch ausblenden und so die Grafik verschönern1 |
Display
operation - offset and width
The data stretch shown starts at the time
Offset
and it's width is Width seconds. For best information, both values
are shown in a time format as hh:mm:ss.ms AND in a decimal format directly
in seconds.
The parameter Offset Steps defines
the increment for the scroll operation. For scrolling, press the up/down
arrow buttons right of the digital display in the Offset box.
The same operation works for the display
width: By pressing the up/down arrow buttons right of the digital display
in Width, more or less data points are shown. If the amount of data
exceeds the prefefined limit, a warning message is shown. It is possible
to continue, but the action may take longer.
For scrolling through the data and not
missing anything, set both steps to identical values. Then a click of the
up/down arrow in Offset shows directly the next or previous data.
For information only, the number of data points is shown in the item "Values:". If the number gets very high and your systems slows down, you can reduce the amount of data shown using data reduction methods.
Zooming out
Now select Zoom ®
Out 2x from the object menu of the display object.
To return the original display, click
on Auto Scale.
Panning
Near the display are scroll bars. By clicking
the up/down arrows at the scrollbars or dragging the scrollbars directly
with
the mouse, the display moves.
How to find channels and their graphs
A name can be assigned to each input channel.
Under the channel name on the display's left side, the line type, the point
type and their color are shown. This allows easy identification. The settings
of these values can be modified in the Setup panel.
As a guideline, on a Pentium 233MMX system
with 64 MByte, processing times of a 20MByte data file are:
| No of data points shown | Compress value |
|
||
| Skip | Min/Max | Mean | ||
| 1000 | 10000 | 2.8s | 2s | 2.8s |
| 10000 | 1000 | 4.8s | 5.5s | 5s |
| 50000 | 200 | 9s | 11s | 9.2s |
In case similar viewing operations are performed on nearly the same data set, the time may drop significantly: Microsoft® Windows® uses a file cache in the RAM area that is currently unused. If the data fits into the cache, no further disk access will be necessary and times above drop to below than 2s.
Interpolation
Remind that the lines are only an interpolation
between real data points. To disable the lines, in Setup change the linetype
to ". . .". Then only the data points are shown in the manner selected
by pointtype.
A note on differences in multichannel acquisition timing and multichannel display
In
the image, an excerpt of a 4 channel data capture is shown. By zooming
into the us area, single data points are shown. The display shows all 4
channels taken at the same time. This is done for technical reasons, but
it is not correct. In reality, the data acquisition card uses a multiplexer
to switch the channels to one A/D converter successively. That means that
there is a time difference of the size (1/sample rate) between these data
points. Usually, it does not influence the accuracy of the reading. Only
in cases where the phase relationship between the input channels is important,
measurements can go wrong.
In this case a data acquisition card like
the DAQ i148, that has 2 A/D converters, is preferrable.
Multichannel sample rate
The sample rate shown in the Acquisition
settings is the sum sample rate. It is the conversion rate that
the A/D converter is set to. If multiple channels are scanned, the sample
rate of one channel equals the sum sample rate divided by the
number
of channels. Other programs sometimes specify a sample rate per channel.
Please note, that, according to the Online Manual, there are sample rate
limitations while multichannel acquisition is performed (does not apply
to DAQ i148). The program cares for these limits for the sake of easy and
safe operation, even if the limit may not be reached.
Sound cards: In stereo / two channel mode the sample rate is the sample rate of one channel!
Scaling
The buttons Autoscale X and Autoscale
Y provide autoscaling separately for each axis after a new data stretch
is shown.
It ensures that all data is shown at first
in the display regardless of the previous state.
Printing
Pressing this button creates a hardcopy
of the whole window on the default system printer. Please note that the
data file's name is shown on top of the display. This function provides
easy archiving of printed window data.
Export
For further post processing, the complete
data stretch in the display can be exported in an ASCII data format. For
each channel, one data file is created. The first channel is in 'data1.asc',
the second in 'data1.asc' and so on, up to 'data8.asc'.
Always 8 files are created. If a channel
is unused, it contains all values zero.
Quit
Leaves the program to the Main Selection
Window.
Each virtual channel is shown in a separate
display window that can be moved inside the working area of the VEE runtime.
To move the window, drag the mouse pointer
to one of the edges of the virtual channel display, click the left mouse
button and move the window over the surface of the Offline display window.
Unfortunately, it is not possible to resize this window.
At 800x600 screen resolution, the display
window will hide parts of the Offline display. A screen resolution of 1280x1024
has space for an Offline Display and 5 virtual channel windows that do
not hide each other.
The virtual channel window is clipped if it is moved off the screen. This behaviour can be used to "park" windows at the lower edge of the main window.
All virtual channel graphs are updated each time the Offline display gets updated.
Virtual channels 7 and 8 feature markers for precise data evaluation.
Take into account that data reduction affects the quality of the calculations. On the other hand, some functions can be performed with data reduction only. For example, an FFT of 10.000.000 points takes a very long time, whereas 10.000 points can be managed.
The properties of the graph, the scaling
and the colors can be changed.
By
clicking the right mouse button in the rectangle of the X-axis name, The
Edit axis window appears. The setting of "Step Size" affects the distance
between data points on the X axis. The default setting 1 does not need
to be changed. The number of Log Cycles defines how many decades the display
contains.
By
clicking the right mouse button in the rectangle of the Y-axis name, The
Edit axis window appears. The mapping sets the scale type (linear of logarithmic)
of the axis. The number of Log Cycles defines how many decades the display
contains. For example, the default setting of 4 stands for 10 to 100000.
By
clicking the right mouse button in the rectangle of the trace name, The
Edit traces window appears. Color, Line type and point type can be
changed.
Please note that all these settings are
not stored. After leaving the data logger window, they are lost. All settings
that are stored permanently on disk are modified in the Setup window. Some
of these settings are also shown in the windows above. For applying changes
that are stored, open the Setup window.
shows data immediately. It works up to 8 channels.
(zeigt die gemessenen Daten direkt an, nach einigen Sekunden Berechnungszeit)
In the grey display area, click the right mouse
button. A menu appears with the following items:
(Rechtsklick auf das graue Feld liefert ein menu mit folgenden
Befehelen:)
Zooming in (Vergrößern)
Click the right mouse button. From the
pop-up menu select Zoom ®In.
Move the pointer to the upper right-hand
corner of the area on which you want to zoom. Then click the left
mouse button and drag the outline box to define the area.
Release the mouse button. The zoomed
area is displayed.
To return the original display, click
on Auto Scale.
Shortcut: Click the left mouse button
and drag the outline box around the area you want to zoom, then release
the button.
Zooming out
Now select Zoom ®
Out 2x from the object menu of the display object.
To return the original display, click
on Auto Scale.
Panning
Near the display are scroll bars. By clicking
the up/down arrows at the scrollbars or dragging the scrollbars directly
with
the mouse, the display moves.
Input channel selection
Sound cards have only to possible selections:
One channel (mono), sum of left and right channel and two channels (stereo),
that means left and right channel separately.
Data acquisition cards: For one channel,
select A1, A2 or any other channel in the From input box. Then select
Single Channel in the Scan to input box.
For two or more channels, select the start
and last channel in From input and Scan to input. If a card
with 16 input channels ist used, either all or a subset of the lower 8
channels A1...A8 or of the upper 8 channels A9...16 can be shown together.
Mixing up these two sets is not supported, i.e. to scan A8 and A9 only.
Examples:
Scan channels A1, A2 and A3: From input=A1,
Scan
to input=A3
Capture mode
| Immediate | Takes data immediately. Any number of samples, from 1 to 100000, can be taken. |
| Trigger: >level | Data capture is started if input voltage level is higher than setting of Trigger level slider. Only 32,64,128,256,512,1024,2048,4096,8192 or 16384 samples can be taken. |
| Trigger: <level | Data capture is started if input voltage level is less than setting of Trigger level slider. Only 32,64,128,256,512,1024,2048,4096,8192 or 16384 samples can be taken. |
| Trigger: +edge | Data capture is started if input voltage rises from below setting of Trigger level slider to higher than Trigger level. Only 32,64,128,256,512,1024,2048,4096,8192 or 16384 samples can be taken. |
| Trigger: -edge | Data capture is started if input voltage rises from above setting of Trigger level slider to lower than Trigger level. Only 32,64,128,256,512,1024,2048,4096,8192 or 16384 samples can be taken. |
As outlined in the DAQ Online Help, in general triggering makes no sense if more than one channel is scanned.
| One-time | Repetitive |
| Press the Single shot/Free running button until Single shot is shown. | Press the Single shot/Free running button until Free running is shown. |
| Storage oscilloscope
mode
Unique events Continous acquisition |
Standard oscilloscope
mode
Trigger enabled |
Please note that toggling the mode while
the acquisition runs (the Start button is shown pressed down) has
no effect.
The acquisition must be stopped for changing
the acquisition mode.
Press the Start button to take data immediately or let the card wait for the specified trigger condition. Press the Stop button for halting the acquisition.
Color
Any of the predefined colors can be set.
Color is an issue if monochrome printers are used. The recommendation is
to use different linetype and/or pointtype settings to identify different
channels and to set the color to "Black" for all channels.
Linetype
provides drawing of solid, dashed, dotted
and dot-dashed lines. Second, an invisible line can be drawn. As result,
the associated channel becomes invisible. Take this option if you want
to print channels separately in the Offline Display.
Pointtype
marks the data point, and not the line
interpolation. Various signs are available.
X scale number format
sets the type of scale for the x axis.
Seconds is default, it means that the
ticks are printed in seconds. For example, if the display is one hour,
the rightmost tick equals 3600. If it is 1ms, it equals 0.001.
The other settings is "time". The ticks
are printed in the format <days>/<hours>:<minutes>:<seconds>.
This data format is comfortable if longer time stretches are worked with,
but it can not display fractional seconds.
As a simple rule, use "seconds" format
if the data spans less than 1 minute and "time" format if it exceeds a
minute.
Enable
Check this box to turn on a virtual channel.
Title
Enter text that is shown on top of the
window of the virtual channel.
X axis name, Y axis name
This text is shown along the axis.
X scale, Y scale
"Linear" and "log" (logarithmic base 10
scale) are implemented. Press the button until the right scale is shown.
Formula
contains the formula that processes the
input data. There are a number of predefined variables:
A1, A2, A3... A8 stand for the input channels
1 to 8. Every virtual channel can reference the data of all input channels.
All built-in functions of Agilent VEE can be used. For reference on mathematical
functions, see the VEE function help. For temporary results, the variables
t1 to t8 can be used. They hold one-dimensional arrays. For calculations,
the preset variable "N" holds the current number of data points that are
processed in the formula. A formula can consist of up to 32 lines. Every
line of the formula, except the last line, must be terminated with a semicolon
(";").
Examples:
A special case
There are functions that return one output
value for an array input value. For example all mean value functions. They
can be used inside a formula without error, but the graph display will
show a dot only! Change the point type to a visible marker for best results!
Processing
"Array" and "Single value" processing
are available. The most common setting will be "Array". The formula is
applied to every value of the input in one step. The input is the stretch
of data that is currently visible in the Offline display window. It is
stored in form of an array. The formula processor gets an array for each
input channel and applies the formula, creating a new array that is shown
in the virtual channel's graph window.
Example:
Start and Stop buttons
A data capture can be stopped at any time.
By pressing the Start button, the data file is erased and rewound.
Data capture starts from beginning of the file. It is not possible to append
data to a file.
Acquisition settings
The acquisition settings are similar to
these used in the Online display. In case a trigger condition is used,
the same restrictions for the number of samples apply.
Update Chart
Check this box if you want to turn on
the chart recorder mode. Take into account that the moving graph display
puts a high load on the computer. For that reason this display is recommended
only for sample rates less than 5kHz. Second, the display buffer will grow
the more data is available. There is no limit for its size. If you encounter
heavy disk activity, slow display update and a high load (above 50%), you
should turn off the chart recorder. Remember that data will be still put
on disk, only the parallel graph update is turned off.
The chart recorder can be turned on and
off any time during the data capture.
Display window
The display buffer can be cleared by clicking
the right mouse button in the chart display selecting "Display"-> "Clear".Inside
the chart display, the settings of the X-axis, the Y-axis and the trace's
settings can be changed. This works similar to the Offline display.
By
clicking the right mouse button in the rectangle of the X-axis name, The
Edit axis window appears. The setting of "Step Size" affects the distance
between data points on the X axis. The default setting 1 does not need
to be changed. The number of Log Cycles defines how many decades the display
contains. Usually, the X axis is scaled linear.
By
clicking the right mouse button in the rectangle of the Y-axis name, The
Edit axis window appears. The number of Log Cycles defines how many decades
the display contains. For example, the default setting of 4 stands for
10 to 100000.
By
clicking the right mouse button in the rectangle of the trace name, The
Edit traces window appears. Color, Line type and point type can be
changed. Please note that all these settings are not stored. After leaving
the data logger window, they are lost. All settings that are stored permanently
on disk are modified in the Setup window.
Bar graph and numeric display left of
bar graph
The bar graph tells about the number of
currently taken samples. The display is intended for immediate indication
of the data capture progress. Depending on the sample rate and total number
of samples, the movement can be fast or very slow. It may also happen that
it doesn't move on continously. This is no malfunction. In any case, the
display shows the number of data points captured, even if the movement
of the bar graph is not visible.
Status message box
tells about the acquisition status. "Running"
means an active data capture, "Stopped" an inactive data logger. There
can be also error messages shown like "Fifo overflow". In this case, stop
the data capture and try again with different settings, i.e. turn off the
strip chart display or use a lower sample rate.
System load indicator
shows the current computer load because
of the data capture. The system load is calculated by retrieving the number
of available samples that were taken but have not been written to disk
until that time. On a fast computer, samples will be directly written because
the datalogger application gets sufficient process time to do so. On a
slow computer, the datalogger gets less time, so less samples are written.
A constant load above 100% is likely to stop the data capture because of
a FIFO buffer overflow. If this happens, try to terminate all other unneeded
processes. Also a disk defragmentation can improve the speed, because the
operating system does not need to look for free sectors scattered on disk.
Information on files written
The data logger writes two files: a binary
data file with the extension 'bin' and a settings file with the extension
'daq'.
It is done that way because the settings
can be loaded, together with the data, into the Offline display later in
order to recreate the data and the associated state.
One data point equals 16 bit. The conversion
from binary to real data takes place 'on the fly' in the Offline display,
for that reason, the data file is very compact.
How to export data to ASCII
ASCII data can be exported directly by
using the Export function in the Offline Display.
In case ALL or major parts of the data
file shall be exported to ASCII data format, use the 'data demangle' function
of the Datalogger Tool in the data acquisition card software package, as
shown in the ines DAQ Online Help. Remind that an ASCII file need about
5 times the space of the binary file!
The Help button in FreeVIEW does not work.
For showing the help, a WWW browser is launched. If there is no action after pressing this button, the path to the browser was not found. The path is read from the Windows registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\CLASSES\htmlfile\shell\open\command . Its value could be "C:\PROGRA~1\INTERN~1\iexplore.exe" -nohome for example. Using "regedit" you can verify the path and value.
The Online Help can be opened too using the "FreeVIEW Help" icon in the "ines sound card driver" program group.The program shows no reaction in the Offline display after I changed the display width
Take a look at the indicator between the Offset und Width slider. Is it red? If yes, the program still is collecting data. Depending on the compression settings, the file size of the binary data file and the display width, the process can take up to 3 minutes if an overview of 2GByte is created.In Datalogger I can't see the file that data is written to
The name of the binary file is shown in the Setup window. Alternately you can turn on the Update Chart button and perform a data capture. Then the filename is shown on top of the chart area.I have Agilent VEE installed and tried to load the FreeVIEW program. There's nothing shown.
FreeVIEW is distributed in a so-called "Secured Runtime version". So the source code is not available. In case you are interesting in making own extensions to FreeVIEW or if you would like to obtain the source code, contact ines directly for a quotation.The issues above didn't solve my problem. How can I get support?
There's technical support only for users of FreeVIEW plus or FreeVIEW sound pro (the licensed version of the sound card driver). All other users may ask and may get a response - or not.
Purchase a licensed version and you will get an answer for sure.
Innovative Elektroniksysteme (ines) GmbH
Goettinger Chaussee 115
30459 Hannover
Germany
Phone: +49 511 943810
Fax:
+49 511 9438122
Info email: info@ines.de
Support email: support@ines.de
WWW:
http://www.inesinc.com,
http://www.ines.de,
http://www.gpib2000.com
ines GmbH may make improvements and/or changes to this program at any time and without notice.
Copyrights and Trademarks
Microsoft®, Windows® and Windows NT® are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the U.S.A. and/or other countries.
VEE is a trademark from Agilent Corporation U.S.A.
FreeVIEW® is a registered trademark of Innovative Elektroniksysteme GmbH, Bad Breisig, Germany
No part of this document may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, recording, or otherwise—without the prior written consent of the publisher.
Disclaimer
FreeVIEW®, FreeVIEW® plus, FreeVIEW® sound and FreeVIEW® sound pro are made available by ines GmbH, Germany.
Parties wishing to make extensions or commercial use of the software should contact ines GmbH for the terms for such use.
ines GmbH does not warrant that the functions contained in the software will meet your requirements, or that the operation of the software will be uninterrupted or error-free, or that defects in the software will be corrected.
ines GmbH does not warrant or make any representations regarding the use or the results of the use of the software or its documentationin terms of their correctness, accuracy, reliability, or otherwise.
No information or advice given by ines shall create a warranty or in any way increase the scope of this warranty. Should the software prove defective, you assume the entire cost of all necessary servicing, repair or correction. Some jurisdictions do not allow the exclusion of implied warranties, so the above exclusion may not apply.
Under no circumstances including negligence, shall ines GmbH and its directors and employees be liable for any incidental, special or consequential damages (including damages for loss of business profits, business interruption, loss of business information and the like) arising out of the use or inability to use the software or its documentation, even if ines GmbH has been advised of the possibility of such damages. Some jurisdictions do not allow the limitation or exclusion of liability for incidental or consequential damages, so the above limitation or exclusion may not apply.