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LXI Reference Design: A Fine Step Forward

By Peter Plazotta
Founder and Geschäftsführer Dipl. Ing.(FH) of TSEP

After five months of work between the LXI Consortium and TSEP, the LXI Reference Design is ready for an official review. The design document includes almost 400 pages at the moment and contains more than 100 classes, over a 100 sequence diagrams, and is based on more than 200 requirements.

The concept of the LXI Reference Design is based on a modular break-up of the LXI specification. As the specification, the design is split up into the corresponding modules, so the instrument vendor has the option to select and use those components which are relevant to his or her project. The following picture shows the modular structure of the Reference Design.

Using Advanced Triggering Methods
to Reduce ATE Test Times

Submitted by VTI Instruments

Introduction

With advances in technology, Automatic Test Equipment (ATE) systems are becoming more widely used across a range of industries including manufacturing, avionics, aerospace, military and defense. ATE systems are efficient and can be incredibly useful, allowing quick and accurate testing that communicates across a set of devices. However, it can become a complicated task to properly setup an ATE system to achieve the user’s desired outcomes. developing an ATE system takes time, and there can be different approaches to achieve the same goal. misusing an approach can cause the system to become less efficient, contributing to more time spent or more resources used to complete the task.

When multiple test instruments are required to work in conjunction with one another to acquire a measurement or sequence of measurements, the ATE architecture becomes even more complex and difficult to design. For example, a test may require triggering a digital multi-meter (DMM) to take a measurement when a relay is closed, triggering a switch module to close a relay when a signal is successfully generated, or triggering a DIO to output a signal after the DMM takes a measurement. Engineers can choose from different triggering methods to find the best approach to achieve their goals. Each triggering method has its own level of efficiency as it relates to execution time and implementation simplicity. Some more deterministic triggering methods can decrease program overhead and latency by allowing devices to communicate directly, outside of the program.

There are various methods for LXI instruments to communicate with one another in a test sequence. An engineer can pace the sequence of events in an ATE system through his or her application code (software triggering). This is very simple to implement in code; however, there is a high degree of dependency on the host to manage the test sequence.