Question about USB diver and user interface

[Amuno]

i am a student, i was asked to develop a driver and the user interface for my device(a logic analyzer).

i have some questions about both diver and the interface.

First, i have not much knowledge about writing a driver(for USB). I have download the template file but i

don't know what the IDquery, reset command and so on. Is it defined by me or I can find them from the USB

specification? Also for the message-based.vi in prefix.llb, what is the application for this vi?

i also want to know about VISA resource name. Do I need to plug in my device and find it using the driver

development wizard

Second, i don't know whether the diver and the interface is writing separately or........

Third, since i need to communicate with MATLAB, too for the graph ploting, can anyone suggest me how to do?using spread sheet or..?

As i have very little knowledge about Labview and driver, so i hope someone can help me.Sorry for any inconvinience.Thank you~!

[Amuno]

can anyone help me?

[Dennis_Knutson]

I would suggest that you first read Developing LabVIEW Plug and Play Instrument Drivers to get an overview on the general structure of an instrument driver. The next thing is to check if your instrument conforms to the USB Test and Measurement Class (Using NI-VISA to Control Your USB Device). My guess is that it would, especially if it's from a major manufacturer and the instrument also has a GPIB control option. If it does, then you don't have to worry about learning any USB raw commands. You write a driver for it as you would a GPIB instrument with the same type of commands. Check the Instrument Driver Network for a similar model. This will greatly speed up the development of your driver. The only real difference between a GPIB instrument driver and a USB instrument driver is that the VISA Resource Name is different. All of the commands for the instrument should be in the programming manual that you got from the instrument vendor. This would include the *IDN? command to get the make and model and the *RST command to reset it. You use the message based VI as a template to write the commands in the manual to the instrument. The VISA resource name should appear in MAX (Measurement and Automation Explorer) under the USB devices listing (i.e. USB::INSTR etc.). The driver devleopment wizard should not be used unless you need to use USB Raw to communicate with the instrument. This is a far more difficult task. Before you write any code, you should use MAX to read and write to the instrument interactively