Interfacing with Python (Pyvisa) requires some work

[hb020]

My main automation platform is around pyvisa (plus some custom code for prologix). I guess that goes for a lot of people.
It would be great if this code would be supported by pyvisa as well.

2 issues 'out of the box':

• pyvisa will not discover the device by itself. What it supports is:
  • VXI-11 portmap (port 111, on UDP or TCP)
  • mDNS discovery of "HiSLIP" (not lxi, and not scpi-raw)
    neither of which are not supported by this firmware.
• communication with the device requires setting of instrument.read_termination = '\n'

The latter is not an issue, but I'd really like to get discovery working. Am still looking if I can find a bypass via Python. And if that doesn't work, I am willing to see if I can integrate VXI-11 portmap or HiSLIP (which is newer, but I'll probably stick to the synchronous channel only). I have some previous work of the first of those two, but the last shouldn't be too complicated.

Will keep this ticket updated. If in the meantime you find a solution, that would be much appreciated.

Minimal python test code for discovery:

import pyvisa
rm = pyvisa.ResourceManager()  # do a discovery
resources = rm.list_resources(query="?*")  # list all devices found, no matter the type
print(resources)  # which prints nothing right now

[morgendagen]

Hi. Some sort of VXI-11 og HiSLIP support would be fantastic. I took a cursory look at it, but for my immediate requirements it was not required.

[hb020]

I have the insides of a hislip server, it even handles discovery, but would require a lot more testing and some more code, as it takes 2 simultaneous sockets, and the state engine and the handshaking are rather involved. The coming week I won't have time for it, but I could try to work on that after that. There is some space free in the ROM, so why not. But I'd prefer to take that on in a second phase.

Also, many more devices are VXI-11 compatible than hislip compatible. hislip is complicated, and it shows in the support. Of my 5 more serious ethernet capable devices, all support VXI-11, 3 support both scpi-raw and scpi-telnet, and only 1 supports hislip.