A System for Interactive Computer Control of Experiments.
Abstract
An integrated system allowing computer control and data acquisition has been developed for the NRL quasi-optical gyrotron experiment. The motivation for this system is manyfold. First, it is necessary to simultaneously monitor several parameters; a difficult task using only oscilloscopes but simple for a computer. Secondly, a computerized system is potentially much more accurate than an experimenter reading numbers off of an oscilloscope and recording them in a notebook. The use of the computer allows the experimenter to visually monitor only the parameters of immediate interest while the computer quietly records all of the necessary data for future analysis. Additionally, since the data is already in the computer, data analysis and plotting is transformed into a process that takes a few minutes instead of large fractions of hours. Because much of this analysis can be done while the experiment is running, the taking of useless data can be held to a minimum. These facts all result in the ability to take much more complete and accurate data in a shorter time period than otherwise would be possible.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Aug 25, 1986
- Accession Number
- ADA171873
Entities
People
- M. E. Read
- T. A. Hargreaves
Organizations
- United States Naval Research Laboratory