Using a joystick in labwindows/CVI realtime

[kander1]

Hi,

I have an application that may need to use a joystick in landwindows/CVI realtime.  It's been a long time since I interfaced to a joystick and I'm not familiar with what is currently available.  Can anybody recommend a joystick that will work in the NI realtime environment?  Do I need to get anything else to go with it, like an ADC card? 

Thanks!

Kevin Anderson

Lockheed Martin

[Riconquistiamola]

Hi Kevin,

National Instruments doesn't have specific recommendations for joysticks, but one that communicates through serial would keep the determinism required by time-critical loops. You could use the Device Driver Wizard to create a driver for the joystick then use VISA commands to read movement.

USB joysticks are not recommended since USB sends interrupts even when not being used. Cheers.

Michael K. | Applications Engineer | National Instruments

[kander1]

I'm not experienced writing device drivers for VISA.  Are there any technical papers or tutorials on it?  Also, I noticed that there is something called the VISA driver developer wizard.  Is this the same wizard you referenced?

Thanks,

Kevin

[Chris_R.]

Hi Kevin,

If you are using a serial instrument, then you don't need to use the VISA Driver Development Wizard.  That is for PCI/PXI, USB, and Firewire devices.  If you have a serial device, the serial port should show up as a  resource on your computer (ie. COM1) and you can communicate directly to your device through the COM port with VISA functions in LabVIEW or LabWindows/CVI.  You can use your built in COM ports on your computer or serial hardware.  Click here for a detailed document on serial communication if needed.  Also, in LabWindows/CVI, you can go to Help>>Find Examples and search for VISA to find some examples on how use VISA in LabWindows/CVI.

I hope this helps you get started, but let me know if you have any questions!