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OpenScope MZ Ubuntu 18.04 Installation Issues


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Hi, trying to get new OpenScope MZ (from the original KS, just now getting around to this!) working on Ubuntu 18.04 desktop system.

The OpenScope MZ getting started instructions did not work for me. Here's what did thanks in part to @wyojustin

  • Installed digilent-agent but it does not show up in task bar
  • Try to execute digilent-agent from command line. That worked.
  • Plugging in OpenScope MZ to USB has no effect
  • http://localhost:42135 gives a 404 error
  • Try putting waveformslive.com in chrome address bar. That works.
  • Now I can start the firmware update, etc. That update went smoothly.
  • Calibration completes but the web page still says it is uncalibrated. Did it again. No change. Ignore and continue.
  • Now I can make a sample measurement with scope 1 (orange) connected to wavegen (yellow)
  • Randomly the PC speaker outputs a thump, seems to be caused by WaveformsLive. What's up with that?
  • digilent-agent terminal frequently spews out binary data (?) Should I worry?
  • What exactly is the need to go to a web site at waveformslive.com to use this scope? That seems an awfully circuitous way to get a local display. Is all the scope data getting sent to AWS and then back in the display? Or AWS is serving the display and data gets merged in locally somehow? And what if I don't have a fast Internet connection everywhere I want to use this tool?
  • Would like to trigger this MZ from a AD2 to get two more analog channels to log. 
  • Now to read documentation and try to get useful results.
  • Also will try under Windows 10 Pro

image.png.7974da3e13674cc528e6e2ce72749979.png

Thanks to @wyojustin and this helpful forum post.

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Hi @Bruce Boyes,

No idea about Ubuntu setup and I'm really not an expert about this, but here are some of my thoughts that hopefully will be of help to you and maybe others:

On 12/6/2018 at 8:36 AM, Bruce Boyes said:

Plugging in OpenScope MZ to USB has no effect

This sounds like a driver related issue. When you first plug-in the OpenScope, drivers should install automatically. If not, maybe you can try to manually install the drivers (check this out).

On 12/6/2018 at 8:36 AM, Bruce Boyes said:

http://localhost:42135 gives a 404 error

42135 is the port used by the Digilent Agent for WaveForms Live to communicate to it. If you try to access the Digilent Agent directly from your browser, I'm not suprised you get a 404 Error, since this is not a valid HTTP request expected by the agent.

Let me explain how I see it:

WaveForms Live itself is a front-end that displays a GUI in your browser. It has no access to the physical ports of your device/PC (I know unfortunately this is not exactly true in reality, but I guess it is for WaveForms Live) and for this reason a back-end is used to establish a connection to the OpenScope MZ through USB, namely Digilent Agent.

Digilent Agent simply identifies Serial COM Devices attached to your device/PC and makes them available to the front-end by establishing a HTTP server on your machine using port 42135.

The front-end knows about that port and the routes required to communicate with this server. It sends out HTTP requests to it and gets responses. The Digilent Agent is just a bridge between OpenScope MZ and WaveForms Live, forwarding messages in both directions.

You actually only need it at first to configure the OpenScope MZ to use your WiFi network. After that, the OpenScope MZ itself can act as a server and WaveForms Live will be able to communicate directly with it. This means the communication will be over your access-point but still inside your local area network rather than over your device/PC only as it would be with the Agent. So no need for an Internet connection in any of the cases. Will be slower also because of the WiFi network in between. I hope this answers the following question:

On 12/6/2018 at 8:36 AM, Bruce Boyes said:

What exactly is the need to go to a web site at waveformslive.com to use this scope? That seems an awfully circuitous way to get a local display. Is all the scope data getting sent to AWS and then back in the display? Or AWS is serving the display and data gets merged in locally somehow? And what if I don't have a fast Internet connection everywhere I want to use this tool?

Using waveformslive.com just makes sure you are running the most up-to-date version of it. There is no limitation I can think of when running it locally (check for the offline build)

On 12/6/2018 at 8:36 AM, Bruce Boyes said:

Calibration completes but the web page still says it is uncalibrated. Did it again. No change. Ignore and continue.

 I think cookies and local cache are used to store configuration data. I am not sure about the calibration data. I would expect it to go into the flash of the OpenScope MZ. But maybe clearing your browser cache and cookies will help getting this fixed.

On 12/6/2018 at 8:36 AM, Bruce Boyes said:

Randomly the PC speaker outputs a thump, seems to be caused by WaveformsLive. What's up with that?

OK that's weird. Cannot imagine that this has anything to do with Digilent.

On 12/6/2018 at 8:36 AM, Bruce Boyes said:

digilent-agent terminal frequently spews out binary data (?) Should I worry?

These are most likely the binary chunks from your measurement. The terminal just shows you what is being sent as a HTTP response to WaveForms Live. Communication is using JSON format, but for the measurement data this is far too much overhead. So the binary data is sent in raw format, upfront a JSON 'header' specifying the amount of data following. Have a look at the Digilent Instrumentation Protocol. No need to worry about that.

On 12/6/2018 at 8:36 AM, Bruce Boyes said:

Would like to trigger this MZ from a AD2 to get two more analog channels to log.

Short note on this: My latest knowledge is that the Trigger_IN as well as Trigger_OUT functionality are yet to be implemented in the OpenScope MZ firmware. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

 

Regards

Fabian

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