A NOVEL PXI-BASED DATA ACQUISITION AND CONTROL SYSTEM FOR SINGLE STRETCHED WIRE MAGNETIC MEASUREMENTS FOR THE LHC MAGNETS: AN OPERATION TEAM PROPOSAL

A Windows based programme in Visual C++ should replace the existing sun Solaris (Unix). The overall software system should be designed with object- oriented approach to adapt to the future needs. The structure in simple terms should be divided into three parts. The front end software modules would essentially be for the hardware interaction (software Drivers) modules which would normally be provided by the commercial NI system. The middleware would have to be written in a structured manner and would interact with the drivers and should have clear interface for easy modification in case of propriety changes in commercial hardware & software. The higher-level user application module and GUI should cater for the need of data presentation, analysis & display. The essential features should be presented as: •There should be only one GUI to carry out all the tasks. All sub-tasks e.g readtension, contactcheck should be in the menu driven application. •A check should be made of the status of all the signals coming into the PXI cards. Subroutines should check the individual device status. •The GUI should also display the level of each stage. •Clicking the contact check routine should automatically check the continuity of the wire and insulation of the wire with respect to the magnet. •The GUI should be able to display real-time current applied to the magnet, status and so forth. •File selection in case of different types of magnets and different measurements should be automatically driven by selection based on the name of the magnet and corresponding scripts. •Combo box type selection of test instead of writing of the test name in command prompt. •A combo box on the GUI should provide the choice regarding apertures for double-bore magnets. •During the analysis, the results should be displayed with a range of colours. For under range it should be yellow, green for OK and over range with red.