[time-nuts] OT: Prologix GPIB and HP3478A...

[Jeff Mock]

Prologix wrote:
> 
> One solution is to turn read-after-write off (++auto 0) before connecting
> the adapter to 3478A, and then use ++read command to read one measurement at
> a time. Please see the manual (www.prologix.biz) for ++read command options.
> 

I nearly always turn off auto mode on the prologix.  I've run into a 
number of slightly flaky problems when the prologix guesses to turn on 
the instrument to talk.  I've never noticed a performance penalty 
because I need to issue a "++read" command to the prologix whenever I 
want to read something back.

I think the prologix device is great.  I'm a linux guy, I haven't used 
windows in many years.  NI has never really understood open source 
software.  It was always a pain to have a reliable driver for the NI 
GPIB PCI cards, so I was quite happy to find something like the Prologix 
device that is reliable and has drivers that are totally open source and 
distributed as part of the linux kernel.

I have a slightly off-topic question about reads.  When issuing a 
"++read eoi", is it possible to tell whether an EOI was actually 
returned by the instrument or whether the read was terminated by timeout 
or block size limitation?

jeff