Measurement Computing DAQFlex User Guide - Manual (Page 24)

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Chapter 3
DAQFlex Software Reference
The DAQFlex Software API is an open source library that implements a simple message-based protocol
consisting of text-based commands, or messages. The API is written in C#, is designed for cross
platform portability, and does not require a separate configuration utility or a configuration file.
DAQFlex Software API contains two classes:
 DaqDeviceManager class
 DaqDevice class
DaqDeviceManager class
The DaqDeviceManager class includes the following methods:
 GetDeviceNames() – gets a list of devices that support the message-based protocol.
 CreateDevice() – creates a DaqDevice object, which contains the methods used to communicate
with a DAQ device.
 ReleaseDevice() – frees the resources associated with a DaqDevice object.
DaqDeviceManager.GetDeviceNames()
Gets a list of DAQ devices that support the message-based protocol.
C#: static string[] GetDeviceNames(DeviceNameFormat format);
VB: Shared Function GetDeviceNames(ByVal format As DeviceNameFormat) As
String()
Parameter
format
The format to use for a device name. This parameter is a DeviceNameFormat enumeration. The
enumeration values and the format of the return strings are listed below:
Value Return string format
NameOnly "Device name"
NameAndSerno "Device name::Device serial number"
NameAndID "Device name::Device ID"
NameSernoAndID "Device name::Device serial number::Device ID"
Return value
An array of strings containing the device names of all DAQ devices that support the message-based
protocol.
Remarks
 The values contained in the array can be used to create a DaqDevice object for the device that you
want to program.
The DaqDevice object is created using the DaqDeviceManager
CreateDevice static method.
With the DaqDevice object, all DAQ operations are configured using one API method called
SendMessage () rather than using multiple operation-specific methods.
 The NameOnly format is not useful if multiple devices of the same type are connected, since the
application won't be able to differentiate between one device and the other. If you are using
multiple devices of the same type, then use one of the other formats.