hardware behaviour when program closed

[Robi_F]

Hi all

My DAQmx hardware controls some safety relevant circuitry. I want to be sure that my HW enters a predefined state when my labview program or the PC crashes. I there anything like a stand alone default state when the communication stops working?

[Bob_Schor]

Look up "Watchdog Timer".  The notion is that whatever you need to be "protected" (your "HW") needs to require something from its "Controller" (your PC running its LabVIEW Program) to "reset its timer" periodically to prevent the Timer from running out of time and "entering a predefined state".  So your code does something like use a DIO line to output a 1 Hz square wave to the WatchDog -- if the WatchDog doesn't see a transition in a second, it "does its thing".

Bob Schor

[crossrulz]

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@Robi_F wrote:

My DAQmx hardware controls some safety relevant circuitry.

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Anything safety critical, I would avoid Windows and DAQmx devices and go with a cRIO.  The FPGA is extremely reliable, and I have yet to have any issues with the RealTime Linux on the controller.  You will still want to implement some type of watchdog at each target transition (Windows->RT, RT->FPGA) and properly shutdown the circuitry as necessary.

[Robi_F]

Hi.

Thanks for the reply. Unfortunately I have what I have. So with standard USB hardware there is no way to program a built in default?

For example, the device name is stored in to hardware itself.

[p27]

>Unfortunately I have what I have.

I would love to know what would happen if you said this to an onsite safety officer 🤣

I've encountered a similar issue before but it was mitigated using external hardware that would gate the USB DIO outputs based on the state of one particular DIO output.

>the device name is stored in to hardware itself

Is this true?  I thought NI MAX just stored the serial and the name you give it for lookup when plugged in later...

[Bob_Schor]

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@Robi_F wrote:

Unfortunately I have what I have. So with standard USB hardware there is no way to program a built in default?

For example, the device name is stored in to hardware itself.

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There is no (easy) way to program a built-in static "default".  This is why WatchDog Circuits look for a dynamic signal from the Controller, effectively saying "I am alive and Working Properly" -- if this ever stops (because of a bug, the PC crashed, Windows started forcing an update, or something else), the WatchDog, running on the piece of equipment being protected, shuts the system down "gracefully" (however that can be accomplished).

Bob Schor

[Robi_F]

And such a watchdog doesn't exist on standard usb NI hardware I suppose.

Actually this would be a nice feature..

[billko]

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@Robi_F wrote:

And such a watchdog doesn't exist on standard usb NI hardware I suppose.

Actually this would be a nice feature..

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Funny you should mention it.  DAQmx has a watchdog timer API, so (depending on your particular instrument) you have this exact feature.

[Robi_F]

to all: Thanks a lot for the help