Instrument Control through GPIB-USB Communication with LabVIEW

This paper discusses a LabVIEW based virtual instrument (VI) developed for the instrument control of a mixed signal oscilloscope with a built-in arbitrary waveform generator. This instructional material was developed for a course on virtual instrumentation offered to the undergraduate and postgraduate students. The assignments were focused on Lab-VIEW programing, interfacing and control of instruments with LabVIEW and data acquisition. The virtual instrument control was fascinating to the students and it was demonstrated through six different MSO functions discussed here. The developed VI also incorporated instrument drivers, enabling a better understading of communication and integration of the same, with LabVIEW VIs. This VI is used for signal generation, acquisition, spectrum analysis, and display of a signal. The effectiveness of student learning is reported from the student’s responses.