Integrating Data Acquisition and

Instrument Control with Your Scilab

Scripts

Darcy Dement

Marketing Director

National Instruments France

darcy.dement@ni.com

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NI HQ

Who We Are

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•Leaders in Computer-based Measurement and Automation

•Long-term track record of growth and profitability

•$677M revenue in 2009

•More than 5,100 employees; operations in 40+ countries

•Fortune’s 100 Best Companies to Work For 11 consecutive years

•16% invested in R&D

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What We Do

Low-Cost Modular Hardware for

Measurement and Control

Productive Software Development Tools

Highly Integrated Systems Platforms

Used By Engineers and Scientists for Test, Design, and Control

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The Numerical Mathematics Consortium

http://www.nmconsortium.org/

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Discussion Topics:

Connecting Math with the Physical World

• Need for adding interactivity & instrumentation

• A software option for interfacing with the physical world: NI LabVIEW

• Using Scilab with LabVIEW

• Use cases

• Demo

• Technical information

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Textual Math Strengths

• Scripted math

• Sequential order of execution

• Vector and matrix operations

• Algorithm design for signal

processing

• Familiarity

• User network and community

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Need for Instrumentation & Interactivity

• Acquire real-world data

with hardware

• Generate real stimuli

• Control any of 1000’s of

instruments with available

drivers

• Perform frequency

analysis, probability,

statistics, math, curve

fitting, interpolation, digital

signal processing, etc.

• Create custom algorithms

• Visualize data with

professional user

interfaces

• Generate reports

• Publish and control

applications on the web

• Connect to databases

• Efficiently store data in

multiple file formats

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Need for Instrumentation & Interactivity

• Acquire real-world data

with hardware

• Generate real stimuli

• Control any of 1000’s of

instruments with available

drivers

• Perform frequency

analysis, probability,

statistics, math, curve

fitting, interpolation, digital

signal processing, etc.

• Create custom algorithms

• Visualize data with

professional user

interfaces

• Generate reports

• Publish and control

applications on the web

• Connect to databases

• Efficiently store data in

multiple file formats

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Mathematical

Simulation

Measurement and

Presentation

Complementing Your Scripts with

Instrumentation and Presentation

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Mathematical

Simulation

Measurement and

Presentation

Complementing Your Scripts with

Instrumentation and Presentation

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What is LabVIEW?

Compiled Graphical Development Environment for Engineering & Science

• Implement and deploy custom applications

Automated test & measurement

Graphical system design

• Easily implement and deploy custom GUIs by applying an open, hybrid (graphical + textual) programming approach

• Acquire / generate signals, instrumentation

• Apply analysis and signal processing

• Present results in an interactive graphical format locally or online

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Integrate LabVIEW with Scilab Scripts to

Add Interactivity to Simulations

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Integrate LabVIEW with Scilab Scripts to

Add Interactive Visualization to Simulations

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LabVIEW-Scilab Script Integration Simplifies

Acquisition and Analysis of Live Signals

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ni.com/idnet: Your Source for

Instrument Drivers with LabVIEW

Drivers for 6000+ instruments from over 275 vendors

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Multiple NI Data Acquisition Options, Same Software

PXI Express

Wi-FiEthernet

PXI

PCI PCI Express

USB

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Instrument Your Algorithms

DEMO

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How it Works:

Using Scilab Scripts within LabVIEW1. Install Scilab 4.1.1 or later, LabVIEW 8.0 or later, and the

freely downloadable gateway

2. Open LabVIEW, create a new LabVIEW VI, and

insert a Scilab script node on the VI block diagram

3. Enter your Scilab script in the Scilab script node

4. Right-click the Scilab script node border, select

Add Input or Add Output, and enter input / output variable

names

5. Connect LabVIEW wires to the new inputs and outputs

When you run your application, LabVIEW invokes the

Scilab engine to execute your script

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Downloading the Free Scilab-LabVIEW Gateway

scilab.org ni.com/info and enter: infoscilab

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Conclusion & Call-to-Action

• LabVIEW adds instrumentation and interactivity

to bring life to your mathematical simulations

• Let us know about your applications for the

Scilab / LabVIEW link (forums.ni.com, or

http://url.ie/6dns)

• Try LabVIEW free for 30 days – download at

ni.com/labview

darcy.dement@ni.com