measComp Release Notes

Release 2-5-1 (November 20, 2020)

• drvMultiFunction.cpp
  • Fixed bug in waveform digitizer mode, current channel was being calculated incorrrectly.
  • Improved poller to reduce the number of error messages when the device is not available.
• E-1608::AInScanStart_E1608 (Linux)
  • Added 5 retries to start waveform acquisition. It appears that sometimes the connect() has not actually completed before acquisition is started, and the device returns a "not ready" status.
  • Improved error messages when acquisition does not start correctly.
  • Bug fix for 1-byte message not being sent correctly.
• mcBoard_E-1608.cpp (Linux)
  • Bug fix where lock was not taken when it should be.

Release 2-5 (November 9, 2020)

• Improvements to USB-CTR04/08 support
  • Added support for reading the 8 digital I/O bits in the MCS scan. This allows capturing the status of input and output bits during a scan. There are now 9 MCS spectra: 8 for the counters and 1 for the digital I/O.
  • Added ability to select counters to use in the MCS on an individual basis, rather than the first and last counter to use. This also applies to the digital I/O word.
  • Added an AbsTimeWF waveform record containing the absolute time of each point in waveform digitizer and MCS scans.
  • Added support for cbDaqInScan and cbDaqSetTrigger on Linux.
  • Aded TrigMode record to control the trigger mode of DaqInScan.
  • Fixed bugs on Linux when the number of counters selected was not a power of 2. The data could be wrong and it would stop before the number of channels to collect was reached.
• Added support for E-DIO24 module on Linux and Windows .
• Added autoconverted OPI files for edm, caQtDM, CSS-Boy and CSS-Phoebus.
• Updated the version of the Measurement Computing Windows UL library from 6.51 to 6.72.

Release 2-4 (September 14, 2019)

• Improvements to USB-CTR04/08 support
  • Added support for Linux.
  • Added Dwell_RBV record to show the actual dwell time which can be different from requested.
  • Added Point0Action record to control how the first time point in an MCS scan is handled. Choices are "Clear", "No clear", and "Skip".
  • Fixed bugs when FirstCounter!=0 or LastCounter!=7.
  • Fixed initialization bug which was causing random crashes at startup.
  • Improved update rate at long dwell times.

Release 2-3 (August 9, 2019)

• Improved behavior for E-1608 when there are brief network outages. If the waveform digitizer was running when the outage occurred it would stop and not restart when the network recovered. This has been fixed, and tested with the E-1608 on both Linux and Windows.
• Added Makefile to produce autoconverted OPI files from medm to edm, CSS/BOY, and caQtDM. Added/updated the autoconverted files for these.

measComp Release Notes

Release 2-2 (October 4, 2018)

• Modified Ethernet support on Linux to be tolerant of brief network outages. Previously it was not flushing stale input before sending a command and reading the response. This could result in a stale response being read, rather than the response to the current command. If the network cable was briefly disconnected, for example, the driver would never recover. Now the driver does recover if the cable is briefly disconnected. If the device is not reachable for a longer time the OS will close the socket, and the code does not yet handle this.
• Updated to latest version of Warren Jasper's Linux drivers, and applied patches. Pushed patches back to his repository where he has merged them, including the change to the Ethernet code described above.
• Added support for E-TC32 to measComp library on Linux. Previously it was not supported due to a conflict with E-TC.h.
• Fixed bug in Linux support for E-TC32. It was not passing the channel number correctly when reading the temperature.
• Fixed bug in Linux support for E-1608. It was not releasing mutex when it should, error introduced in R2-1.

Release 2-1-1 (August 29, 2018)

• Fixed bug in E-1608 driver, it was not creating epicsEvent in constructor.

Release 2-1 (June 28, 2018)

• Changed from using std::thread and std::mutex to using epicsThread, epicsMutex, and epicsEvent from the EPICS libCom library. This allows it to build on older compilers, and is easier to understand.
• Rearranged code directories.
  • Split linuxSrc into cbw_linuxSrc (which contains the cbw library emulation for Linux) and LinuxDrivers (which contains Warren Jasper's Linux drivers).
  • Moved cbw.h, cbw32.lib, and cbw64.lib from src/ into new directory measCompSupport.
• Fixed problem with uninitialized variables in E-TC and E-TC32 drivers on Linux. This could lead to failures to connect to the devices at iocInit.

Release 2-0 (March 22, 2018)

• Added support for Linux. Previously measComp was limited to running on Windows because it uses the Measurement Computing Universal Library (UL), which is available only on Windows. The Linux support is designed as follows:
  • It uses the [low-level Linux drivers from Warren Jasper](https://github.com/wjasper/Linux_Drivers).
  • On top of these drivers the module provides a layer that emulates the Measurement Computing Windows UL library.
  • The EPICS drivers thus always use the UL API and are identical on Linux and Windows.
  • The Linux UL layer is independent of EPICS, and uses std::thread and std::mutex to provide the required threading and mutex capabilities. These methods require C++11, and so will not build with very old compilers. They do build with gcc 4.8.5 (e.g. RHEL 7/Centos 7), and gcc 4.4.7 (e.g. RHEL 6/Centos 6).
  • Currently only the E-1608, E-TC, and E-TC32 models are supported on Linux. Support for other modules is straightforward to add and can be done as the need arises.
  R2-0 is backwards compatible with previous releases but was given a new major release number because of all the new code that was added to support Linux.
• Added support to drvMultiFunction for the E-TC. This is an Ethernet module with 8 thermocouple inputs (type B, E, J, K, N, R, S, T), digital I/O, and a counter. Added new medm screen ETC_module.adl and new iocBoot directory, iocETC. This device is useful in applications where the length limitation of USB and/or the ability to move around without an attached computer are important. This module has Linux support.
• Improved the support for the E-1608 to include fast analog input, i.e. waveform digitizer support. Also added Linux support for this module.
• Added Linux support for the TC-32 module using Ethernet. This is not yet tested.

Release 1-5 (March 2, 2018)

• Added support to drvMultiFunction for the E-1608. This is an Ethernet module with analog input, analog output, digital I/O, and a counter. Added new medm screen E1608_module.adl and new iocBoot directory, iocE1608. This device is useful in applications where the length limitation of USB and/or the ability to move around without an attached computer are important.
• Renamed 1608GCounter.template to measCompCounter.template, since it is a generic file.
• Changed line endings in all .substitutions files to be Linux.

Release 1-4 (September 18, 2017)

• Added support to drvMultiFunction for the USB-1608G. This is similar to the previously supported USB-1608GX-2A0 except that is is 250 kHz vs 500 kHz, and does not have the 2 analog output ports.
• Added support for new version of USB-1608GX-2A0 which is functionally the same but has a different board type identifier.
• Renamed the iocBoot/iocUSB1608G to iocUSB1608G-2A0, and added new iocUSB1608 directory for the USB-1608G.
• Added support to drvMultiFunction for the USB-231, and a new iocUSB231 directory.
• Removed parameter counting and NUM_PARAMS argument to asynPortDriver constructor in all drivers. These are not needed in asyn R4-32.

Release 1-3-1 (May 12, 2016)

• Added support to drvMultiFunction for the USB-1208FS.
• Fixed problem with measCompTemperatureSetup.adl medm screen for TC-32.

Release 1-3 (May 10, 2016)

• Added support to drvMultiFunction for the TC-32, which is a 32-channel thermocouple input module with both USB and Ethernet interfaces.
• Added new iocBoot/iocTC32 directory.
• Updated from release 6.50 to 6.52 of the Measurement Computing Universal Library.

Release 1-2 (February 11, 2016)

• Added support for the USB-1208LS and USB-2408-2A0.
• Renamed the drv1608G driver to drvMultiFunction because it is now designed to handle any multi-function model. It currently supports the USB-1208LS, USB-2408-2A0, and USB-1608GX-2A0.
• Updated from release 6.3 to 6.5 of the Measurement Computing Universal Library.

Release 1-1 (June 26, 2014)

• Added support for the new USB-CTR04/08 counter/timer modules. This includes support for the EPICS scaler record (similar to the Joerger VSC and SIS3820), and multi-channel scaler mode (similar to the SIS3820). This device can replace the SIS3820 in most applications for $429, which is less than 10% of the cost of the SIS3820.
• Updated from release 6.1 to 6.3 of the Measurement Computing Universal Library.
• Added dependency on synApps mca module for USB-CTR08 driver.
• Added more fields to the measCompAnalogIn_settings.req and measCompAnalogOut_settings.req files for save/restore.
• Added _RBV (readback) fields for pulse generator Period, Frequency, Width, and Delay since the requested value may not match the actual value due to hardware limitations.
• Add new demoSrc directory that contains a tutorial/demo on how to write a driver using asynPortDriver. The example is based on the USB-1608GX-2AO. It includes:
  • 6 versions of the demo driver source code, starting with a very simple 132 line driver that just does 2 analog output records, and ending with the full driver that is 1255 lines and has waveform digitizer and waveform generator support, etc.
  • A new iocMeasCompDemo directory with the various versions of the startup script.
  • New medm files (measCompDemoTop.adl, 1608G_V[1,2,3,4,5].adl).
  • New files in the documentation directory, measCompDriverTalk.pdf and measCompTutorial.pdf that were presented at an EPICS class on writing drivers based on asynPortDriver.
• Added the Run record to measCompPulseGen_settings.req, so it remembers the run/stop state.

Release 1-0 (Nov. 28, 2011)

• First release. Has support for USB-4303 and USB-1608GX-2AO.