Why doesn't modern LA-gui have cursor info? - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / testgear

author: RAPo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 15, 2024, 11:13:04 am
content: I've just required a Tek 1241. While playing with it, it just dawned on me that it has cursor info: changing your position in the time frame updates the state {1,0} of each channel, and it sums up all the channels.I would like to have this on my digital LA software, but none of them (pulseview, DS-view, zeroplus) shows this on their GUI.Any reason why?

author: artag
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 15, 2024, 11:33:42 am
content: Probably because the number of channels on a traditional LA is so large that laying it out like the Tek screen would be unweildy beyond a very small number of signals. Even on the Tek display it seems to only be showing a subset..I haven't tried this but you might explore on your favourite tool :Typically, serial busses can be analysed on-display and show a separate trace (more like an eye diagram than an oscilloscope trace) that places the byte value numerically on the trace.If you can group several signals together and have them displayed as a parallel bus in the same way, you will probably get instantaneous bus values shown, perhaps only where the cursor is placed to avoid overfilling the display. You might be able to set up a single bit bus to do what you want.I'm not sure if this feature actually exists, it's kind of a mishmash of expectations and partial features. But it ought to. And for Pulseview at least, anybody could add it, because it's open software.

author: RAPo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 15, 2024, 11:43:22 am
content: Thanks for your quick reply. I made a very simple channel grouping in order to show what I'm talking about.In the modern gui's there isroom for adding state info on each channel, just right of the channel label.In the top bar, you can provide the sum.Will look into you're suggestions and yes, each LA-gui should have this ;-)

author: Electro Fan
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 15, 2024, 05:02:57 pm
content: https://www.pctestinstruments.com/index.aspsome cursors but maybe not the functionality you are looking for

author: RAPo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 16, 2024, 09:59:18 am
content: Thanks, its a step in the right direction, but to fork out another $400 is a bit much.

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 16, 2024, 10:15:04 am
content: Quote from: Electro Fan on June 15, 2024, 05:02:57 pmThat device is horribly outdated when it came onto the market about 20 years ago. It has like 1k or 2k points per channel. That is useless for any serious logic analyser work.

author: RAPo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 16, 2024, 11:39:36 am
content: Yeah, certainly, if you compare it to the devices I have.I've sent a mail to Dreamsourcelab to see if they can implement it in the next version of DSView.Quote from: nctnico on June 16, 2024, 10:15:04 am

author: TomKatt
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: June 16, 2024, 01:33:36 pm
content: Is what this discussion referring to the equivalent to a parallel decoder? I have never tried, but I thought DSview or Sigrok did that?If not, it should be possible to either create a custom decoder, or worst case modify the source code to provide whatever functionality you desire - isn’t the code open source on GitHub?

author: RAPo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 16, 2024, 02:29:08 pm
content: Well thats one of the suggestions that I'm investigating.Thinking more about it:a) the ability to choose one exact point in the time frameb) update the channel setting with its state at that moment, just after the channel labelc) calculator cursor value(s) based on groupselecting and then put out the value in the format you want (hex,octal,binary)and an additional wish: skip to the next frame where the cursor value is different from the selected value.a) should be easyb) should require some changes to the screen paintingc) possibly by adding a decoderd) is extra functionality.Quote from: TomKatt on June 16, 2024, 01:33:36 pm

author: RAPo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: June 17, 2024, 05:25:12 pm
content: I tried the Pararell decoder in Pulseview.It somewhat does the summing I described, but I cannot select a point in time to see the states at that point.It is very slow for a lot of channels and long signals.Didn't have time to look into the source code of sigrok/preview.Thanks again for your suggestions.Quote from: artag on June 15, 2024, 11:33:42 am