This appendix contains a brief guide to the engineering commands
accepted by the engineering interface and operating system with some additional
comments and points to be aware of as well as some warnings about individual
commands.
The first group of commands are issued directly to the operating system at the OS/9 prompt as they are either part of the operating system or are implemented as standalone programs. These commands may be used during normal operation of the instrument unlike some of the test programs which are not designed to be used which the robot is operational
(eg grid.c, dmc300.c, digio.c)
ENG Start the engineering interface, exit using the QUIT command.
MONITOR Display a list of nodes currently logged in to Autofib-2 with monitor mode enabled.
DIAGNOSTICS Display the current network layer diagnostics.
TRANSMIT Transmit a message via the network layer, different fields will be prompted for, input is case sensitive and should be entered in upper case only.
RLOG Display log of last 20 received messages.
TLOG Display log of last 20 transmitted messages.
STOPALL Shut down the control system safely.
STARTALL Start up the control system (nb do not use while the control system is running.
SEE xxx Display the status of a mechanism. No mechanism code will display usage and a list of valid mechanism codes.
LASTMOVE Display the last fibre move attempted by the robot. This consists of fibre number and origin and destination positions of the fibre.
LASTERROR Display the last error that occurred when moving a fibre.
The following commands are issued to the control system via the engineering
interface. The engineering command interface is started by typing eng [return]
at the OS/9 prompt on the micro computer. The OS/9 prompt may be obtained
either at the engineering terminal (if connected) or by logging into the
micro computer as Autofib using a telnet link. When started the engineering
interface prompts the user to enter the HELP command for further information
if necessary, typing HELP allows the user to access a very simple help
menu, typing HELP followed by the command name gives the user basic information
about the command and it required parameters. Commands are not case sensitive.
BACKILLUM state Turn the guide fibre backillumination to state (ON or OFF). WARNING ensure that the Westinghouse tv is not powered up or serious damage will result. Autofib assumes that the guide fibre illumination state is the same as the spectroscopic fibres backillumination state. Therefore if the guide fibres are not backilluminated but the spectroscopic fibres are backilluminated then the control system will not allow the movement of any fibre as the software will check that the backillumination (ie guide fibre backillumination) is ON. Conversely if the guide fibre backillumination is on but the spectroscopic fibre backillumination has failed then the control system is unable to prevent attempted movement of a fibre.
CENTROID Find the centroid of the image currently seen by the fibre viewing system of the robot gripper. Reports the position in microns from the centre of the tv.
DIAGNOSTICS As for the command issued at the OS/9 level. This command is generated by running a subprocess to run the diagnostics.c program at the OS/9 level.
DISABLEFIBRE n Temporarily disable spectroscopic fibre n from use. This command may be reversed using the ENABLEFIBRE command. Once disabled it is not possible to move the fibre, view the fibre or perform any actions with the fibre. Note that disabling a fibre MAY make target fields already configured illegal. The park and circle configurations are automatically regenerated when a fibre is disabled.
DISABLEGUIDE n Temporarily disable guide fibre n from use. This command may be reversed using the ENABLEGUIDE command. Once disabled it is not possible to move the fibre, view the fibre or perform any actions with the fibre. Note that disabling a fibre MAY make target fields already configured illegal. The park and circle configurations are automatically regenerated when a guidefibre is disabled.
ENABLEFIBRE n Enable use of spectroscopic fibre n. This command reverses the effect of the DISABLEFIBRE command which temporarily disabled the fibre. Range 1-number of fibres in the current fibre module, this command will only work on spectroscopic fibres. The park and circle configurations are automatically regenerated when a fibre is enabled.
ENABLEGUIDE n Enable use of guide fibre n. This command reverses the effect of the DISABLEGUIDE command which temporarily disabled the fibre. Range 1-number of fibres in the current fibre module, this command will only work on guide fibres. The park and circle configurations are automatically regenerated when a fibre is enabled.
EXTENDED This command is not listed in the help menu system, once used this command allows the used of a few dangerous commands. A password is required for successful completion of this command. The extended command mode remains in force until the RESTRICTED command below) is given.
EXTRACT Extract the robot from an X or Y limit switch. The robot checks if the robot is in a limit switch and is necessary overrides the limit switch to restore power to the motors and drive the robot out of the limit switch before removing power. The robot must then be powered up and initialised in the normal manner. This command is most likely to be used if the WAKE command fails due to the motor power failing to turn on when the robot is left in a limit switch.
GRIPPER state Change the gripper jaws status to the state supplied, state may be either OPEN or CLOSED.
HARDRESET Perform full reset of software flags and VME hardware. The motors and instrument power will be swtiched off and a full reinitialisation will be required.
HEALTH Send a health monitor message to the application layer to test the response.
HELP commandname Access the engineering help menu. Commandname is an optional commandname for which more detailed information is required. Leaving out the commandname means that a one line summary of all commands will be listed.
ITERATIONS n Set the maximum muber of retries allowed in the fibre placement process, range is 0-9, default value is set on starting up the control system in the af2params.dat file.
INIT Initialise the off axis probe and robot in that order. Instrument and motor power must be on.
KILLFIBRE n Permanently remove spectroscopic fibre n from use. This command may only be reversed by manually editing the current fibres data file record for the fibre. After using this command it will be impossible to use the robot to park or otherwise move the fibre.
KILLGUIDE n Permanently remove guide fibre n from use. This command may only be reversed by manually editing the current fibres data file record for the fibre. After using this command it will be impossible to use the robot to park or otherwise move the fibre.
LASTERROR As for the command issued at the OS/9 level. This command is generated by running a subprocess to run the lasterror.c program at the OS/9 level.
LASTMOVE As for the command issued at the OS/9 level. This command is generated by running a subprocess to run the lastmove.c program at the OS/9 level.
LIGHTS state Turn the internal inspection lights to state (ON or OFF). WARNING ensure that the Westinghouse TV is not powered up or serious damage could result.
LOADFIBRE n flag Update the position of fibre n in memory and on disk. flag determines the method used to determine the fibre position. Flag = 0, it is assumed that the fibre has been centred in the gripper tv system by moving the robot and therefore the current robot position is used as the current fibre position. Flag = 1, it is assumed that the fibre is currently visible in the gripper tv system but the position is determined by centroiding the image and adding the offsets from the centre of the tv to the current gripper tv position. Flag = 2, it is assumed that the robot has been moved to the last known position of the fibre and that it may not be visible, a spiral search covering an area of approximately 5mm by 5mm is conducted which stops if a fibre image is found which does not correspond to another known fibre. The fibre image position is determined using a centroid and this position used to update the fibre records.
LOADMODULE Check and update the position of all the usable fibres (i.e. not dead or disabled) in the current fibre module. This command may take a while (20-30 minutes).
LOCAL Set the control system to accept action commands from the engineering interface only, status requests may still be made from the utility network, no parameters.
LOGGING state Switch the placement accuracy logging to state (ON or OFF).
MONITOR As for the command issued at the OS/9 level. This command is generated by running a subprocess to run the monitor.c program at the OS/9 level.
MOTORS state Switch the motor power to state (ON or OFF). If the instrument power is required to be turned on then this will be done automatically.
MOVEFIBRE n x y Move fibre n to x,y using the robot after checking that this will not cause a collision.
MOVEPROBE p Move the off axis probe to position p. Range is 0-150000 with 0 being fully out of the field and 150000 being fully into the edge of the field. In reality only the two extreme positions are of any use.
MOVEROBOT x y Move the robot gripper to position x,y in microns. Range of parameters is size of patrol area of the robot. values???
NETRESET Reset the network layer software error counters. See the results by entering the DIAGNOSTICS command to display the current network layer diagnostics information.
OFFSETFIBRE n dx dy Offset fibre n by dx,dy microns. Check that this will not cause a collision and move the fibre.
OFFSETROBOT dx dy Offset the robot by dx,dy microns. Range of dx,dy is -2000 to 2000. Larger offsets should be done using a MOVEROBOT command. If it is attempted to move the robot outside its allowed area using this command an error will be returned.
PARKFIBRE n Park fibre n using the robot after checking that this will not cause a collision.
PARKROBOT Park the robot out of the field.
POWER state Switch the instrument power to state (ON or OFF). If the motor power is required to be turned off then this will be done automatically.
QUADRANT n Move the fibre viewing system so that it is viewing and adjacent (but overlapping) section of the fieldplate to that currently being viewed. If we assume that the current position is surrounded by 8 equal area sections of fieldplate (as in a 3 by 3 grid) then the top left section is quadrant 1 and the sections are numbered in clockwise order. Range of n is 1-8. If this command is to be used for searching for fibres it is recommended that a sequence of commands to patrol a spiral search area is written down.
QUIT Exit from the engineering interface, no parameters.
RANDOM fibno number This command gets the robot to measure the position of fibre fibno a total of number times moving to a random position between each measurement. Results are appended to a file random.dat in the /h0/autofib/logfiles directory.
RECOVER This command should be used directly after a pickup or putdown failure in order to recover and check the location of the last fibre that was moved, no parameters. If a fibre is recovered successfully the internal fiberror flag is reset allowing further fibres to be moved.
REFERENCE Measure the positions of the four reference fibres in the fieldplate. This command has no real use at present. Results are appended to file reference.dat in the /h0/autofib/logfiles directory.
REMOTE Set the control system to accept action commands from the utility network only, status requests may still be made from the engineering interface, no parameters.
RESETCURRFIB Reset the current fibre variable fibre_no (see section 3.4) This command is dangerous in that it is this variable which limits the movement of the robot while it thinks it is carrying a fibre and prevents the robot trying to pickup a second fibre. It may be necessary to use this command if a failure has occurred leaving a fibre stuck in that jaws as the automatic recover command will not work with a fibre stuck in that jaws. in this case place the fibre on the plate using low level restricted commands then use the RESETCURRFIB command and then the normal RECOVER command.
RESETLOSTFLAG Reset the lost fibre flag fibre_error (see section 3.4) This command is dangerous in that it is only this variable which prevents further fibres being moved if a previous fibre has been lost.
RESTRICTED This command removes access to dangerous commands granted by the EXTENDED command (above). The restricted command mode is the default on starting the engineering interface.
RINGFIBRE n Tell the application layer that fibre n has been manually placed in the load ring. Note that using this command without actually moving the fibre in question could seriously compromise the anticollision software and result in damage to the instrument.
RLOG As for the command issued at the OS/9 level. This command is generated by running a subprocess to run the rlog.c program at the OS/9 level.
SETMIMIC n Set the current engineering mimic display page to n in the range 0-5.
Page 0 null page
Page 1 live video from robot
Page 2 basic text information
Page 3 advanced text information
Page 4 graphical display
Page 5 zoomed in view of graphical display
SETSERVO axis speed accl This command changes the current servo loop parameters for the axis specified, the other two parameters required are the new speed in microns/s and the new acceleration in microns/s/s. There is an upper limit built into the micro code that prevents speeds and acceleration exceeding the maximum tested values being used.
SETUP target Move all the fibres to the configuration described in the file target.fib. If necessary obtain this file from the Vax observing system computer. This command may take upto 30 minutes to complete.
SETVIDEO mode threshold Set the current gripper tv video mode, mode may be either THRESHOLD, NORMAL or INVERSE, for threshold and inverse mode the value of the threshold is required between 0 and 255. Currently NORMAL video mode is used by default.
SLEEP Put the robot into normal hibernation mode, park the robot but leave the offaxis probe in its current position (in case autoguiding is necessary) then switch off the motor and instrument power.
STATIC fibno number This command gets the robot to measure the position of fibre fibno a total of number times withoutmoving the robot between each measurement. Results are appended to a file random.dat in the /h0/autofib/logfiles directory.
STOPSETUP This command sends an immediate STOP the current field setup command to the application layer, if the robot is currently configuring the next target field it will stop at the next safe opportunity (i.e. when the current fibre has been placed).
TELL_LOG Inquire and report the current state (on or off) of the fibre placement accuracy logging, no parameters.
TELL_TRANSFORM Inquire and report the current scale and orthogonality parameters for the robot.
TELLFIB n Inquire and report the status of a fibre. The fibre number n must be supplied in the range 1- number of fibres in the current fibre module.
TELLMIMIC Inquire and report the current active engineering mimic page, no parameters.
TELLPOS Inquire and report the robot and probe positions, no parameters.
TELLSERVO Inquire and report the current DC servo loop parameters for each axis, no parameters.
TELLSOURCE Inquire and report the current command source, no parameters.
TELLSTAT Inquire and report the instrument status, no parameters.
TELLTEMP Inquire and report the current instrument temperature, no parameters.
TELLVIDEO Inquire and report the current fibre viewing frame grabber mode, no parameters.
TLOG As for the command issued at the OS/9 level. This command is generated by running a subprocess to run the rlog.c program at the OS/9 level.
TMOVE t Rotate the theta axis to position t. Note that this command is available in extended command mode only (see EXTENDED/RESTRICTED commands) and is potentially hazardous to the instrument. This command will only appear in the help menu if the engineering interface is in extended mode.
TOLERANCE n Set the fibre placement accuracy tolerance to n microns, range allowed is 0-60 microns, default value is set on starting up the control system in the af2params.dat file.
VIEWFIBRE n Move the gripper/fibre viewing system to the location of fibre n. Range of n is 1-number of fibres. Missing, disabled or dead fibres may return an error.
VIEWFIDUCIAL n Move the mobile sky viewing probe to the position of spare fiducial object n. Before sending a message to the application layer 900 is added to the object number as the spare fiducials are recognised by nuumbers in the range 901-950. Range for object number is 1-50 but an individual target field may have fewer than 50 spare fiducual objects.
VIEWOBJECT n Move the mobile sky viewing probe to the position of the object entering fibre n. Range 1-number of fibres in the current module.
VIEWSKY x y Move the robot carriage so that the mobile sky viewing probe is located at the x,y position supplied.
WAKE Perform a normal initialisation sequence for the robot, power up the instrument and motors, initialise the offaxis probe then the robot. No parameters.
WHICHFIBRE Report which fibre a setup or loadmodule failed on.
ZMOVE z Move the gripper Z axis to position z. Note that this command is available in extended command mode ony (see EXTENDED/RESTRICTED commands) and is potentially hazardous to the instrument. This command will only appear in the help menu if the engineering interface is in extended mode.