Real-time testing software
VeriStand from National Instruments is a software tool for performing real-time testing applications more efficiently. It helps get hardware-in-the-loop or test cell control and monitoring systems up and running quickly.
VeriStand helps get hardware-in-the-loop or test cell control and monitoring systems up and running quickly. With a wide range of out-of-the-box functionality that includes configurable data acquisition and logging, test sequencing, and simulation model integration, VeriStand is said to reduce the time required for product testing. Custom functionality may be added to VeriStand using a variety of software tools, which makes it flexible enough to adapt to even the most complex applications to meet real-time testing requirements. The software helps configure a multicore-ready real-time engine to execute tasks such as real-time stimulus generation, data acquisition for high-speed and conditioned measurements, and calculated channels with custom channel scaling.
Import capabilities
VeriStand also can import control algorithms, simulation models, and other tasks from NI LabVIEW software and third-party environments. It is possible to monitor and interact with these tasks using a run-time editable user interface with tools for value forcing, alarm monitoring, I/O calibration, and stimulus profile editing. Although no programming knowledge is required to use VeriStand, it can be customized and extended with a variety of software environments such as NI LabVIEW, ANSI C/C++, and others for modeling and programming.
Hardware integration
Real-time testing involves using a real-time operating system (OS) as part of a test system. The most common requirements driving the need for a real-time test system are to achieve greater reliability and performance than is possible using a general-purpose OS. VeriStand is designed to run on NI real-time hardware for configuring real-time testing applications.
– Edited by Mark T. Hoske, content manager, Control Engineering, mhoske@cfemedia.com.
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For a related article from Control Engineering, see "Hardware in the loop, FPGAs help testing," linked below. National Instruments is CSIA member as of Feb. 25, 2015.
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