NI-VXI Software Installation and Configuration
Chapter 3
VXI-AT2023/NI-VXI ISC 386/ix Getting Started
3-10
© National Instruments Corporation
Exiting vxitedit and Reinitializing the Hardware
To exit
vxitedit
, type the number
11
when the main menu is displayed or type
exit
. If you
changed any information, the program prompts you to save your changes before exiting the
menu. Saving the configuration information updates the configuration files
vxila.cfg
and
vxibus.cfg
. Do not modify the
vxidev.cfg
file, which contains some system-dependent
timer information used by the
vxiinit
program. Run
vxiinit.exe
to reinitialize the
hardware according to the new settings.
If you changed any of the software configuration settings from the default settings, record the
new settings on the VXI-AT2023 Hardware and Software Configuration Form in Appendix B.
Developing Your Application Program
After you have verified that the driver software has been installed successfully, you can begin to
develop your VXI application software.
Use the VXI Text Interactive Control (
victext
) program to communicate with VXI devices
through commands you enter at the keyboard. This feature helps you learn how to communicate
with devices, troubleshoot problems, and develop your application.
The
victext
command set includes the same capability of NI-VXI function calls in addition to
auxiliary commands that are unique to
victext
. You can use this utility to send data and
Word Serial commands to devices from the keyboard and to display data received from devices
on the screen. After each function executes,
victext
displays the device's response and the
status.
The
victext
utility is designed to help you learn how to use the NI-VXI functions to program
devices. Once you develop a sequence of steps that works successfully for your system, you can
easily incorporate the sequence into an application program using the appropriate language and
syntax.
The file
cvxi
.
c
interfaces between your C language application program and the operating
system entry points to the VXI driver. The functions available in
cvxi
.
c
are described in detail
in the NI-VXI Software Reference Manual for C. To use these functions, you must compile
cvxi
.
c
and include the resulting object file during the link phase of each application compile
operation.
The
/example
subdirectory contains various example programs along with a makefile that
show how to use various functions in the NI-VXI software and how to develop application
programs using these functions.
