ScanWorks®
documentation brings programmers
up to speed quickly
Relying on documentation to learn how to use a technical
software product is not recommended for the faint
of heart. Much to his chagrin, that's exactly what
Jeff Thomson, a contractor to a large aerospace company,
faced. Thomson's expertise is in the graphical test
executives from National Instruments, LabVIEW and
TestStand. His assignment was to automate the application
of ScanWorks boundary-scan tests under these NI test
executives.
“I wasn't familiar with ScanWorks at all before
I started on this work,” Thomson explained.
“Everyone else at the company I was working
for had been trained on ScanWorks, but I had no training
at all and I was being asked to integrate these tests
under LabVIEW and TestStand. I had to ramp myself
up on ScanWorks very quickly.”
Fortunately for Thomson, the online documentation associated with ScanWorks provided him with all the guidance and information he needed.
“I found ScanWorks very well documented,”
he said. “And the user interface is one of the
best I've seen. For a programmer, I thought that the
methodology inherent in ScanWorks of projects which
incorporate designs, and test sequences which are
made up of test actions was very useful. That kind
of structured environment is easy for a programmer
to work with and it helped me get up to speed quickly.”
Thomson was working on a contract with an aerospace
company developing jet engine control systems for
commercial airliners. The control systems were made
up of several circuit boards featuring very high-density,
high-speed components. The control system's circuit
boards had been designed with boundary scan testing
in mind, so they included JTAG access to most of the
components.
Based solely on ScanWorks' online documentation,
Thomson learned how to automate the application of
ScanWorks test sequences under LabVIEW and TestStand.
These test sequences were deployed on the production
line to perform component programming, production
test and diagnostics on circuit boards as they were
produced. In addition, the ScanWorks structural tests
were incorporated into certain functional test routines
as well. Following production test, the circuit boards
would be inserted into a card cage and placed in an
environmental test chamber where they were tested
again over a wide range of temperatures to determine
whether extreme environmental conditions would induce
failures.
NOTE: Thomson can be contacted at 19 Island Way, Southwick, MA 01077 or (413) 531-5775.
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