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Thread: Surfacing Software thats adaptable?

  1. #1
    Allen Weatherby
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    Surfacing Software thats adaptable?

    I would like to know experiences with various lab software used with surfacing labs. I know they all have calculation packages, but comparing usable features and the ability to easily add outside items that will communicate seems to be a challenge for most.

    All of this lab equipment that is OMA or VCA standardized still seems to have many challenges.

    Issues either experienced or witnessed include, Tracer from "company A" hooked to a lab software and the traces to edger from "company B" are not the same as if you had the tracer from "company B" hooked directly to the edger from "company B". You get the idea.

    I am not interested in the complex software that has high monthly maintainace but something that works and is compatible with most other hardware; or can be easily adapted to be compatable with other software.

    Is any package of open source available with calculation software and and a data base?

  2. #2
    OptiBoardaholic
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    There should not be a problem with most lab software since they have standardized the data, http://www.opticallabproducts.com/12/tech_set.php. A good starter site if you need to research equipment.
    Joseph Felker
    AllentownOptical.com

  3. #3
    Allen Weatherby
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    VCA standards

    Thanks for your post Jofelk, however I am well aware of the standard and I am also well aware of the problems with certain manufacturers equipment working with this standard. The OMA and VCA standard focused on an older computer technology system when the PC industry was going to USB as a connection and communications method that would allow various machines to work together. If the VCA would adopt standards that are currently being used with PC it would help from havin to retrofit new computers with ports that are not needed today for most hardware.

    We have had a number of issues with OMA VCA listed items that would not easily communicate with each other.

  4. #4
    Objection! OptiBoard Gold Supporter shanbaum's Avatar
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    Standards

    Quote Originally Posted by AWTECH
    Thanks for your post Jofelk, however I am well aware of the standard and I am also well aware of the problems with certain manufacturers equipment working with this standard. The OMA and VCA standard focused on an older computer technology system when the PC industry was going to USB as a connection and communications method that would allow various machines to work together. If the VCA would adopt standards that are currently being used with PC it would help from havin to retrofit new computers with ports that are not needed today for most hardware.

    We have had a number of issues with OMA VCA listed items that would not easily communicate with each other.
    I'm not sure what you mean by "VCA listed items". The standard enables communications between lab systems ("hosts") and lab machines ("devices"); it doesn't explicitly provide for communications amongst machines. It could be used for that, but doing so would require that devices mimic hosts - something which may be happening, but I'm not aware of it.

    Your comment is the first I've seen to suggest that there's any demand for USB connections; what has been expressed is a demand for network connections, which will be specified in the next version of the standard, on which the task force is presently working.

    It's not accurate to say that the standards effort was in any way "focused on an older computer technology system" (by which I presume you mean, PC serial ports); that aspect of the standard development process - that is, the connection method - hardly constituted a fraction of one percent of the effort. At the time of the initial release of the standard (around the end of 1996), it wasn't clear that either USB or Ethernet would become the ubiquities they have done; serial was it.

    In fact, network connections under the upcoming standard will not vary in any substantive way from serial connections; that is, exactly the same data will be exchanged in exactly the same format. The effort has generally been focused on insuring that the requirements for the data exchange itself - that is, the content - can be met.

    It is true that there are still differences amongst machines, primarily in the way that they express tracing data (or expect it to be expressed), and there may be some assumptions made by one vendor that differ from those of another. Where the trace data gets normalized (the producer or consumer, that is, tracer or edger) is a big one in some instances. However, those differences can in fact be reported under the standard - the fact that they aren't (in those cases in which they aren't) is not a deficiency in the standard, but in its use.

    And these issues are relatively miniscule in any case - the fact that our customers (GC's) have vast numbers of disparate tracers and edgers working together successfully, exchanging data via our software using this standard, makes me wonder what you're talking about.

    If you (or anyone else) wants to contribute to the standards development process - which is an open one - send me an e-mail, and I'll provide you with the task force listserv address.

  5. #5
    Allen Weatherby
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    Standards

    My point to the SHANBAUM post: Based on my experience in trying to have OMA machines talk to other OMA machines from different manufactures it is not easy. Each company still seems to have something that they have not done on their end to allow the communications to take place. I also get the feeling with each issue, (some vendors have been more vocal than others), if you had only bought our solution you would not have this problem. Then they come up with a fix that allows communiction but not all of the data is able to be used once there solution is finalized.

    The hard fact is there is no incentive for any of these manufacturers to make this process easy for items to communicate with each other. If they can all keep saying they comply with the standard and people keep buying thinking they will plug and play, (and they have all said they are OMA and sure they will work with our "X machine" no problem). So you buy you plug but NO PLAY without weeks of computer issues.

    I am not saying all just all I have had to personally deal with!

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