Hello,
I'm a novice to both this power supply and especially programming for it, so I'm hoping someone can offer advice.
We are using the N6700B (with N6752A modules that include the high-speed extension) for simple experiments in which we pulse voltage (or current) on and off repeatedly over a prescribed period (typically 30 seconds to as long as 3 minutes). We're trying to control this using Command Expert. With the help of a coworker, we were able to create a simple sequence to do the pulsing (using a LIST and triggering it), and then I was able to move it into the Excel add-in, which makes it easier to set our conditions.
There are two additional things I'd like to do:
1. Wait until pulsing is complete, then turn off the output and, if possible, alert the user that the experiment has completed. The *WAI command gives me an error every time I try to use it to wait for completion; I'm obviously missing something. In the Excel add-in, I've noticed that even if we're running the experiment for 60 seconds, the sequence reports that it has completed as soon as pulsing initiates. How can I make it wait until the LIST has finished the entire execution?
2. Bring voltage and current data back into Excel at the end of the run. No idea where to start on this.
Thanks very much for any help.
Rob
I'm a novice to both this power supply and especially programming for it, so I'm hoping someone can offer advice.
We are using the N6700B (with N6752A modules that include the high-speed extension) for simple experiments in which we pulse voltage (or current) on and off repeatedly over a prescribed period (typically 30 seconds to as long as 3 minutes). We're trying to control this using Command Expert. With the help of a coworker, we were able to create a simple sequence to do the pulsing (using a LIST and triggering it), and then I was able to move it into the Excel add-in, which makes it easier to set our conditions.
There are two additional things I'd like to do:
1. Wait until pulsing is complete, then turn off the output and, if possible, alert the user that the experiment has completed. The *WAI command gives me an error every time I try to use it to wait for completion; I'm obviously missing something. In the Excel add-in, I've noticed that even if we're running the experiment for 60 seconds, the sequence reports that it has completed as soon as pulsing initiates. How can I make it wait until the LIST has finished the entire execution?
2. Bring voltage and current data back into Excel at the end of the run. No idea where to start on this.
Thanks very much for any help.
Rob
Let's see what suggestions I can make here:
1. I think that the best thing would be to monitor the operating condition register. I wrote a blog post about this feature here: Power Supply Registers Blog Post. You want to monitor the trans-active bit.
2. You need to use the digitizer feature. You can set it up to sync it with your transient trigger. I wrote a blog post about that here: Sync Transient and Measurement Triggers Blog post. Please note that you can read your measurements back as ACSII rather than binary format if that is easier for you to parse.
Let me know if you need any other information.