where can i find vis to communicate (via RS232) with a controller ?

[seb S]

Hi,

i use Labview 6.0 with windowsXP. I have a PCI/RS232 car to connect to my controller.
I'd like to command my controller (no vis available).

i am beginner and my problem is: how to communicate (send commands, know the syntax, formation and transfer of commands and recognition of the responses) with my controller via Labview and serial communications?

[johnsold]

In LabVIEW the VISA Serial VIs and functions provide the basic RS232 communications capability.

As far as the protocol for communicating with your instrument, you need to get that from the manufacturer or vendor. Unfortunately there are no standards and every manufacturer does it differently.

When you get that information come back to the forums if you need more help.

Lynn

[Dennis_Knutson]

To do serial communication, you would use VISA Read and Write that are on the Instrument I/O>Serial palette. There are numerous shipping examples on serial com, app notes and other examples here, and hundreds of threads and examples posted to this forum. In order to know the syntax, etc. of the controller, you would need the doucmentation for that controller. What is the manufacturer and model number? If you were to post that kind of information, you might find someone who has already done the work and would be willing to share.

[seb S]

Thanks so lot for your informations. It helps me.

Following your suggestions, I ask you more helps.
Someone has ever developped a vi to control and/or command a jetDrive III controller from MicroFab Technologies, Inc. ?

Thanx in advance.

[SanaaT]

Hello Sebsanaur,

You can found, in the link below, document that can help you to understand the Serial Communication:
http://zone.ni.com/devzone/conceptd.nsf/webmain/c553228fd78a7add862568f9006e9129?OpenDocument#2

Now about the Instrument driver jetDrive III controller from MicroFab Technologies, you can found in the link below, a NI tool to "Search Instrument Driver" from manufacturers:
http://sine.ni.com/apps/we/niid_web_display.drv_search

The driver you search is not available in our web site however you can contact MicroFab Technologies to see if they develop it for LV.

Hope this help.
Best Regards,

Sanaa TAZI
National Instruments France

[seb S]

Hi,

to send correctly data to my device under test, i'd like to switch the number of bytes.
Would you know how to do that?
In particular, now strings are and remain in 8 bytes and i want to send strings with 4 bytes (switch ASCII to binary data).

Thank you,

Sebastien

[falkpl]

Using Visa to communicate with any serial device is simple. essentially you will open a visa session (most lekeny using resource COM1) call visa write and send the string command and call visa read if you expect a reply back from the controller (some times a simple reply of valid or not valid is returned). What you will need to know about communicating with a serial device over RS-232 is the RS-232 settings on your controller BAUD rate, stop bit, ....etc. and will have to have the string command set for your controller. Cammands are usually a few ASCII characters and sometimes followed by a numeric value. Thsi information can be retrieved from the manufacturer. Also the strings are often terminated with a special character such as a carage return. If you plan on using the controller frequently I would suggest writing a simple labview driver, a set of VI's which pass through it a VISA resource and error cluster and group a bunch of similar commands togeter in a Vi which will issue the approperate string and validate any replies from the controller (Dont worry this is easier than it sounds). Good luck
-Paul

[Mark@MFab]

Hello,

I actually work at Microfab.  I know the post is stale, but I was searching for work others have been doing with the JetDrive III and I found this.  This summer I was brought on to write a LabVIEW program to control the JetDrive III, which has long since been completed.  If you are still working on this project, I would love to hear about it.

Mark C.

[seb S]

Hi Mark C,

i am happy to see you develop also Labview VIs.

Yes, i'd like to hear more.

Thanks in advance

[KSRK]

LabVIEW supports a seperate utitility called VISA APIs to support the serial communication. You can configure, read, or write to a specified port. What you need to know is that the port to be used, Baud rate for your application etc.

Just open any VISA Basic Serial read/write example.... You should feel the syntax or Block Diagram very easy.