To operate the LVP, three separate programs need to be run. All the beamline and press controls run use MEDM. The program used for scanning is called the DATA CATCHER, which runs under IDL. The AIM Multichannel Analyzer is also used with an IDL program called MCA. All of these programs are tied together using EPICS. For more information on EPICS, check out EPICS Application Source/Release Control document. You’ll also find useful information in EPICS and MEDM by clicking here. For information on CARS NT network, click here.

1. MEDM: To run all beamline motion controls

Choose Start > Programs > EPICS WIN32 Extensions in the Start menu of LeBaron or Beetle. You’ll get the following MEDM popup window:

Click File, and Open the file named 13BMD.adl

This will open the main control window called 13BMD.adl:

    Be sure to select Execute button in the MEDM.EXE popup!! Select each field by dragging the mouse in the corresponding button. Keep the left mouse button pressed when going to the next level of selections.  The buttons will allow you to control various components of the LVP setup:

Beamline Control: beam status, equipment protection system (EPS) status, beamline slits (in BM-A and BM-D) etc.

Experiment Information: Allows you to enter specific information on the particular run (the info will be saved in the MCA file, so remember to upgrade the information relevant to each particular spectrum).

LVP Motors: essentially ALL motors for LVP operation

XAS Motors: not used for LVP

DAC Motors: not used for LVP

MCA electronics: electronics for the multi-channel analyzer (MCA).  Canberra amplifier, A to D converter (ADC), etc.

Other electronics: Stanford Research Systems (SRS) preamps (# 2 is used for photo diode input and output); Scaler (used for clock and photo diode readings); Keithley (used for logging in ram position LVDT, pressure, temperature, heater cureent, voltage, thermocouple emfs, etc.); Digital-analog converter (DAC; used for controlling heating power supply).

Scan: used for scanning any positioners (a motor, a cmpound motor, or anything that can be "moved").

User Calcs Etc:

Generic RS232 & GPIB:

 2. Data Catcher: Lets you catch scan data

Telnet to CORVETTE using HOST ACCESS under Exceed6 on LeBaron

Log onto CORVETTE with username LVP_USER and the appropriate password. Since CORVETTE is a Unix box, all commands are case sensitive!

Enter setenv DISPLAY lebaron:0

Load IDL (idl)

Run the data catcher under IDL: IDL > catcher_v1.

After the data catcher is loaded, run Process Variable Setup (PV Setup) by clicking on the setup button and then choose scan.

Enter 13BMD:Scan1 in the field of "SCAN 1D Pvname". For 2D scans, enter the second PV name in the field of "SCAN 2D PVname".

Scan 2 – for 2-D scans

Scan 3 – for 3-D scans

Scan 4 – for 4-D scans

Under "Print" [don’t ask me why ;-)], you may chose to print out your scan results (ASCII) to a printer or save it in a file – be sure to select the correct scan # to save.

3. MCA: for data acquisition. For detailed information on the CARS IDL MCA program, click here.

A. Method one: Telnet to CORVETTE using HOST ACCESS under Exceed6 on LeBaron

Log onto CORVETTE with username LVP_USER and the appropriate password. Since CORVETTE is a Unix box, all commands are case sensitive!

Enter setenv DISPLAY lebaron:0

Load IDL (idl)

Load MCA (mca)

B. Method two: Run directly on leBaron or Beetle.

Choose Start > Programs > IDL5.1 > IDL. This will open the IDL development window:

Choose File > Preferences > Startup and select Working Directory, then choose Path, and add the Working Directory in the path, as shown below (assuming Alimina_010 is the current data directory):

 Choose Path, make sure that the lvp_user|IDL box is checked. 

  Then in the IDL prompt (last line prefixed with IDL> in the IDL development window), type IDL.

When the blank MCA window opens, open the detector by click the mouse on file:

File > Foreground > Open detector, give detector name (13BMD:aim_adc1)

For more descriptions on the MCA, see documents in the "13-BM-D LVP Operations Instruction" manual.

Under File, there are the following options:

Foreground

Background

Swap Foreground <-> Background

Save Next = Filename

Save As…

New MCA Window

Print…

Preferences…

Exit

Both Foreground and Background allow you to collect data (if you choose Open Detector) or display an existing file (if you choose Read File). They can be swapped (Swap Foreground <-> Background). Save Next = Filename tells you the file name (Filename) to be used if you let the MCA program to automatically save the data displayed on the screen. New MCA Window lets you open a new MCA window with various sizes. Print… allows you the plot the data to a printer. The popup looks like:

Note the plot command to print spectrum to printer "gse floor ps". Preferences…allows you to change the preferences for the MCA; it opens the following popup:

The meaning of the various choices is self-explanatory. Choose Yes to activate the choice.

 

A logging program (IDL), lvp_logging.pro, is stored in P:\lvp_user\idl. This program will let you log vital experimental information, such as all motor positions in the LVP table record, press ram position, load in tons, as well as heating parameters current, volts, power, and heater resistance, etc. Be sure to run this program before you start any new run.

Run IDL as described in method two of running the MCA, but this time run it on the Beetle (the computer next to LeBaron). Be sure that Startup up Path points to P:\lvp_user\idl.

In IDL Development window, type

lvp_logging

you’ll get a popup screen like this:

From the Look in: window, select your current working folder (the one that you want to save all your data files), and give the logging file a name corresponding to your run number. For example, if you run is T0208, then name your logging file as T0208.log.

After you hit the Open button, you’ll get the logging displayed like this:

You can resize the window by dragging the margins to show more data. You can also change the time interval between the data recorded and stop and restart the logging again.

Note: the data channels being logged are specified in another file called lvp_logging.inp, on  P:\lvp_user. You’ll need to modify this file if you need to change the data to be logged. 

6.1. To Reboot the VME crate (get permission before doing this):

Telnet to CORVETTE using HOST ACCESS under Exceed6 on LeBaron or Bettle

Log onto CORVETTE with username epics and the appropriate password. Since CORVETTE is a Unix box, all commands are case sensitive!

Change directory epics > R3.13.0 > CARS > iocBoot > ioc13BMD

Type 13bmd and return

type cntl/Y three times (??? On screen)

This will save all current motor positions to the file filename.sav. Note that this file is automatically saved in the iocbmd folder on the J drive. You’ll need to move it to your current working folder (best to save it in the folder where you store all the data files.

6.3. To restore motor positions after a VME crate failure (get permission before doing this):

Open IDL and make the startup path as

J:\epics\R3.13.3\CARS\iocBoot\ioc13bmd

On IDL prompt, run

Epics_restore, ‘filename.sav’,’auto_positions.sav’

This will copy all motor positions that you’ve saved in filename.sav to the file named auto_positions.sav. Rebooting the crate will restore the positions of the motors on the crate.

 

7. Experimental Startup Reminders

(1). Create directory for data on Corvette (you can use leBaron to do this). Structure should be

lvp_user/data/mmmyy/material_nnn where mmm is the three-digit month, yy two-digit year, material is the material name, and nnn a three digit sequence number. For example:

lvp_user/data/nov98/Alumina_011.

(2). In that directory, copy the mca.preferences and the catcher.env files from the previous directory. The mca.preferences files makes starting the mca file easier, and the catch.env file lists the environment variables written to the header of the data files. Click here to see an example of such a file.

(3). When loading IDL, be sure to make this new directory the working directory.  

(4). Finally, exist all IDL programs (MCA, Keithley, Catcher) and IDL itself and restart them from the new directory. You do NOT have to do this with MEDM, since it doesn’t write any files, and the data is stored in the VME crate itself.

(5). File naming convention. All files start with a capital letter T (stands for T-Cup) or D (DIA), followed by a four-digit sequence number (e.g., T0095). For MCA files collected in the same run, the extension is another three digit number (e.g., T0995.001), which is the ID of that file. Make sure the file sequence number is correct before you start.

 Note: All of these can be run using the Windows version of IDL. After loading IDL, select file>preferences>Startup and change the working directory to your current directory (the one in which the files will be written, or where they are currently stored). This directory is automatically included in the IDL path, so you do not have to add it. Enter the name of the procedure in the command line, and answer the questions.

This program reads the Keithley DMM and logs the data to the screen and to a file at intervals selected by the user. Be sure to position and size the IDL window before you run Keithley, because you cannot move or resize it while it is running.

After you start the program, you are asked for a filename for the output file. You should use a name like T0056.LOG or D0056.LOG. If the file already exists in the current directory, the new data will be appended to the file.

You are then asked for a wait interval. Enter a number (normally 10). During logging, you can change the interval to any integer value from 1 to 10 by entering that key (0=10). To stop logging, press any other regular key. While logging is running, the IDL window is locked up, so you cannot modify it.

This is a modification of the Plotlog program used for SAM85 data at the NSLS. It reads the log file created by Keithley, and creates 6 screen plots of the data. You can optionally also send the plots to the printer.

 After you enter the log filename, the first plot appears on the screen. To go to the next plot, place the mouse cursor on the plot and press the mouse key. Continue through all the plots. When they have all been displayed, you have to answer whether or not you want a hard copy. Enter "Y", "y", "N", or "n" on the command line.

 This program does a full spectrum fit to mca data. You must first create a .pks file, which is an ASCII list of peaks with a preliminary value for their energies and widths. See, for example, alumina.pks in the IDL directory of LVP_USER in Corvette.

To run, enter FIT_MCA_DATA, ‘mcadataname’, ‘peaksfilename’

An output file is created with ‘_pks’ added to the extension of the mcadataname file

Example: FIT_MCA_DATA, ‘T0067.002’, ’NACL.PKS’

These commands and filenames are NOT case-sensitive, even though they are located on Corvette.

 This program converts APS format data (with 5.3 filenames) to SAM format (with 8.3) filenames. You can then read these files with PLOT85, which is on Corvette (using eXcursion).

Run the program by entering APS2SAM, filespecification, where filespecification is a file name, in quotations. The filename can include wild cards, so you can use 'T0056.0*' to convert files T0056.001 through T0056.099 to T0056001.APS through T0056099.APS.