LabVIEW-based remote and mobile access to real and emulated experiments in electronics

ABSTRACT

In the frame of the E.U. "Leonardo da Vinci" project it was accomplished the research and development of several solutions for the distance (and mobile) access to remote reconfigurable laboratory work-benches for e-Learning within electrical engineering education. The authors implemented session-based step-by-step- / auto-mated- (synchronous or asynchronous) test & measurement sequences with remote access - fixed (to rich content) or mobile (with content-to-terminal adaptation), oriented on equipment (with instrument virtualization) or on application with a high degree of visualization (ranging from web-cam monitoring to "hyper-schematics"). The hardware, netware and software developed (in co-design based on Hewlett-Packard "Measurement Subsystems Architecture") is ranging from proprietary solutions to highest degrees of standardized interfacing (mainly IEEE 488.2 "GPIB"), SCPI instrumentation control, dedicated drivers or Interchange-able Virtual Instruments, IVI, and "Measurement Studios" software. From the industrial informatics point of view, the present paper is oriented on case studies based on National Instruments LabVIEW suite.

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INDEX TERMS

Primary Classification:
  B. Hardware
  B.1 CONTROL STRUCTURES AND MICROPROGRAMMING

Additional Classification:
  B. Hardware
  B.1 CONTROL STRUCTURES AND MICROPROGRAMMING
      B.1.3 Control Structure Reliability, Testing, and Fault-Tolerance**
  B.2 ARITHMETIC AND LOGIC STRUCTURES
      B.2.3 Reliability, Testing, and Fault-Tolerance**
  B.3 MEMORY STRUCTURES
      B.3.4 Reliability, Testing, and Fault-Tolerance**
  B.4 INPUT/OUTPUT AND DATA COMMUNICATIONS

  C. Computer Systems Organization
  C.2 COMPUTER-COMMUNICATION NETWORKS

  D. Software
  D.4 OPERATING SYSTEMS
      D.4.4 Communications Management

  H. Information Systems
  H.4 INFORMATION SYSTEMS APPLICATIONS
      H.4.3 Communications Applications
          Subjects: Information browsers
  H.5 INFORMATION INTERFACES AND PRESENTATION (I.7)
      H.5.1 Multimedia Information Systems
          Subjects: Artificial, augmented, and virtual realities
      H.5.2 User Interfaces (D.2.2, H.1.2, I.3.6)

  I. Computing Methodologies
  I.6 SIMULATION AND MODELING
      I.6.0 General

General Terms:
Experimentation, Measurement, Standardization, Verification

Keywords:
LabVIEW, e-learning, electrical engineering, remote experiment, simulation, test & measurement, virtual instrument