Communications Options
M370430-01 Rev B 6-65
Introduction to the LXI Standard
This section is meant only as a brief summary of some of the
features of LXI. For a more complete description of LXI please
refer to the LXI Consortium Home Page. The authoritative
description of LXI is the LXI standard.
VXI Discovery
LXI devices are required to conform to the VXI 11 discovery
protocol. The AMETEK LXI Discovery Browser uses this
discovery protocol to locate LXI compliant devices on the network.
This makes communicating with devices and locating their
addresses simpler.
LAN Requirements
LXI mandates many useful LAN requirements
Dynamically
Configured Link
Local
Addressing
If there is no DHCP server available, the unit will use the Dynamically
Configured Link Local Addressing protocol to assign itself a link local
address. This is useful for cases when a network is down or unavailable
but the user still wants to connect to the power supply.
The unit can obtain a dynamic address using the DHCP protocol
The unit can be given a static IP
Web Page
This ensures that the pages will display correctly on all W3C
compliant Web browsers
Must have a homepage
which displays
manufacturer, serial
number, IP address, etc
This ensures all LXI compliant devices have a similar look and
feel to their Web pages
Device Identification
Function
A Web page button that causes an LED to flash on the power
supply. This makes determining which power supply a user is
communicating with simpler.
This page allows for changing the values of LAN parameters
like IP address, Gateway, Subnet Mask, etc
Remote Procedure Calls (RPC)
RPCs are a part of the Open Network Consortium. RPC is designed to
facilitate distributed programming. In the case of power supplies it allows
for a program running on a computer to communicate to any number of
power supplies over the network.
Drivers
LXI compliant devices are required to provide an IVI Specific Driver.