© National Instruments Corp.
4-1
NI-488.2M UM for Windows NT
Chapter 4
Debugging Your Application
This chapter describes several ways to debug your application program.
Running the Software Diagnostic Test
Before you run your application program, you should run the software diagnostic test,
ibtest
, that was installed with your NI-488.2M software. The
ibtest
program is an
NI -488.2M application that makes calls to the driver. If
ibtest
passes, your GPIB
hardware and NI-488.2M software are interacting correctly. The following paragraphs
describe the messages you might receive while running
ibtest
, and how to resolve
each problem.
Presence Test of Driver
The
ibtest
program tests for the presence of the NI-488.2M driver.
ibtest
displays
the following message if it detects a problem:
<<< IBTEST was unable to access the NI-488.2M driver. Please be
sure that the installation completed successfully, the hardware is
installed correctly without conflicts, and the software is
configured correctly. See your Getting Started manual for more
information. >>>
There are several reasons why
ibtest
might be unable to access the NI-488.2M driver.
If the software is not properly installed or if there is a conflict between the GPIB
hardware and the other hardware in the system, the NI-488.2M driver fails to start. Two
Windows NT utilities are useful in determining the source of the problem: the Devices
applet in the Control Panel in the Main group, and the Event Viewer in the
Administrative Tools group. The information available through each utility is described
in the following sections.
Examining NT Devices to Verify the NI-488.2M Installation
To verify whether the NI-488.2M devices are installed correctly (that is, that the devices
are started), run the Devices applet in the Control Panel window in the Program
Manager . This utility lists all of the devices known to Windows NT. Each device has a
status associated with it. If the NI-488.2M driver is installed correctly, the following
lines appear in the list of NT devices:
Device
Status
Started
GPIB Board Class Driver
Started
Automatic
GPIB Device Class Driver
Started
Automatic