UNIX Time-Sharing System: Microcomputer Control of Apparatus, Machinery, and Experiments

Microcomputer Control of Apparatus, Machinery, and Experiments By B. C. WONSIEWICZ, A. R. STORM, and J. D. SIEBER (Manuscript received January 27, 1978) Microcomputers, operating as satellite processors in a UNIX* system, are at work in our laboratory collecting data, controlling apparatus and machinery, and analyzing results. The system combines the benefits of low-cost hardware and sophisticated UNIX software. Software tools have been developed that accomplish timing and synchronization; data acquisition, storage, and archiving; command signal generation; and on-line interaction with the operator. Mechanical testing, magnetic measurements, and collecting and analyzing data from low-temperature convective studies are now routine. The system configurations used and the benefits derived are discussed. The vision of an automated laboratory has promise: computers control equipment, collect data, and analyze and display results. The experimenter, freed from tedium, devotes more energy to creative pursuits, presumably research and development. Unfortunately, the vision has proved to be a mirage for more than one experimenter who, after a year of learning the mysteries of hardware and software, finds the control of experiments as far away as ever. This paper describes a system for laboratory automation using the UNIX time-sharing system that has permitted experiments to be automated in hours rather than years. This is possible because the * UNIX is a trademark of Bell Laboratories.