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16700A: Anything interesting done with Tool Dev Kit?

Question asked by philpem on Jun 15, 2011
Latest reply on Sep 28, 2011 by holtappl

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Hi guys,
Just out of curiosity, has anyone had a play with the Tool Development Kit?

I found it installed on my 16700A and had a quick play with it, though it'd be nice to see what others have done with it.

Thanks,
Phil.

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algoss Jun 23, 2011 5:24 AM
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I wrote a bunch of tools for customers, many years ago. The most involved one was a SW execution tracker.

The customer modified his 'C' source to write the address of each function to a specific location in memory on every entrance, and the address+1 on exit. I used that to build a hierarchical indented display, showing every call and return. In addition I calculated the entry->exit time for each function, including and excluding any calls made by that function, or interrupts during it. It involved building a 'call stack' on the fly. With a 1M trace, I could capture a lot of data.

Later I added task and thread awareness. The customer added some writes into his OS, and I built a 'call stack' for each thread or task.

There were a bunch of others, and I may still have the sources somewhere.

Algoss
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philpem Sep 1, 2011 3:57 PM
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It would be great if the sources for these could be released, if only as an example for those of us who still use 16700 series analysers.

What would be even better is for the licence keys for software options to be 'opened up' now the 16700 series is out of support... as I understand it, the software options are no longer available?

Thanks,
Phil.
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algoss Sep 2, 2011 4:50 AM
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Phil,

I just went looking and a lot of stuff is just "lost". I've been through 4 or 5 computers since I wrote that stuff. I think I have it one or more backup files, and when I have some time, I'll sort through it and find some relevant sources. I'm a plain-vanilla 'C' programmer, who started with FORTRAN II, so there's nothing fancy about my code.

As for the licenses, once a product goes out of 'support life', usually 5 years after discontinuance, one of the first things to be decommissioned is the license generating SW. In this case it ran on HP-UX systems that are long gone.

Al
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philpem Sep 2, 2011 6:18 AM
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"
As for the licenses, once a product goes out of 'support life', usually 5 years after discontinuance, one of the first things to be decommissioned is the license generating SW. In this case it ran on HP-UX systems that are long gone.
"

In that case, would there be any possibility of getting some form of "license release" or similar?

That is, for certain out-of-support instruments where the software options can no longer be purchased or activated, the license generation details could be released for the benefit of users. Or where this is unavailable, some form of limited license to the effect of "if you can figure out how to make soft-opt activation keys for the product in question, you may do this for personal use only, and only on out of support instruments". Effectively, something like how manuals are distributed -- several "free download" sites (KO4BB for one) have been granted licenses to distribute PDF versions of equipment manuals, on the proviso that these are distributed free-of-charge, and that the equipment in question is listed as "out of support" on the Agilent website

I know I'm probably asking a lot, but it would be a nice gesture. Perhaps you could put me in contact with the relevant people at Agilent to negotiate this?
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algoss Sep 6, 2011 10:08 AM
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Unfortunately, 'support life' is exactly that. No SW support, of any kind, is available after the end of that time period, which for the 167xx family was 8/2/2010. HW support is on a best effort basis.

If you had asked a year ago, just after the 167xx family went out of support, the answer might have been slightly different. At this time, the HP-UX systems, as I said, are gone. They were turned off, and are probably scrapped by now.

There might be some hackers out there who know how to break into HP-UX systems, and can disable the licensing, but I haven't heard of any.

I tend to keep things around for a long time, but I took my personal 16700 to the recycling center a few months ago. It was loud, and used a lot of power. Due to nostalgia, I still have some working 64000 HW, but that will go soon. It has been 20 years since it went off the price list and 15 years since end of support.

Al
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holtappl Sep 28, 2011 11:23 AM
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"
I tend to keep things around for a long time, but I took my personal 16700 to the recycling center a few months ago. It was loud, and used a lot of power.
"

This is the stuff that makes grown men cry. Last week I finally bit the bullet and bought a 16702B with two 717 cards. For a good deal of hard earned cash.
I ended up here googling around for flying leads, which unfortunately weren't included. As I acquired the machine for personal use, $750 per pod is on the high side [cough]. There's a set of 6 on eBay for $350, that's without grabbers.

Perhaps I have to look at a homebrew solution of sorts.

Bert
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16700A: Anything interesting done with Tool Dev Kit?

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