2600S-901-01 Rev. C / January 2008
Return to
14-7
Series 2600 System SourceMeter® Instruments Reference Manual
Section 14: Display Operations
NOTE Care must be taken when imbedding character codes in the text
string. It is easy to forget that the character following the
$
is part of
the code. For example, assume you want to display “Hello” on the top
line and “Nate” on the bottom line, and so you send the following
command:
display.settext("Hello$Nate")
The above command displays “Hello” on the top line and “ate” on the
bottom line. The correct syntax for the command is as follows:
display.settext("Hello$NNate")
Returning a text message
The
display.gettext
function returns the displayed message and can be used in five ways:
text = display.gettext()
text = display.gettext(embellished)
text = display.gettext(embellished, row)
text = display.gettext(embellished, row, column start)
text = display.gettext(embellished, row, column start, column end)
embellished
Set to
false
to return text as a simple character string. Set to
true
to include
character codes.
row
Set
to
1
or
2
to select which row to read text from. If not included, text from both rows
is read.
column start
Set to starting column for reading text.
column end
Set to ending column for reading text.
Sending the command without the
row
parameter returns both lines of the display. The
$N
character code will be included to show where the top line ends and the bottom line begins. The
$N
character code will be returned even if
embellished
is set to
false
.
With
embellished
set to
true
, all other character codes that were used in the creation of each
message line will be returned along with the message. With
embellished
set to
false
, only the
message will be returned.
Sending the command without the
column start
parameter defaults to Column 1. Sending the
command without the
column end
argument defaults to the last column (Column 20 for Row 1,
Column 32 for Row 2).
Input prompting
Display messaging can also be used along with front panel controls to make a user script
interactive. For an interactive script, input prompts are displayed so that the operator can perform
a prescribed action using the front panel controls. While displaying an input prompt, the test will
pause and wait for the operator to perform the prescribed action from the front panel.
Menu
A user-defined menu can be presented on the display. The menu consists of the menu name on
the top line, and a selectable list of menu items on the bottom line. The following function is used
to define a menu:
