Appendix D Common Questions
PCI-MXI-2 for Linux D-2 ni.com
Which NI-VXI utility program must I use to perform startup Resource
Manager operations?
Use the Resman program to perform startup Resource Manager operations.
It is located in the NIVXI/bin directory (/usr/local/nivxi/bin by
default). Resman uses the settings in the Configuration Editor of
vxitedit. It initializes your VXI/VMEbus system and stores the
information that it collects to the resman.tbl file in the tbl subdirectory
of the NIVXI directory.
What can I do to make sure that my system is up and running?
The fastest method for testing the system is to run Resman. This program
attempts to access memory in the upper A16 address space of each device
in the system. If resman does not report any problems, the VXI/MXI
communication system is operational.
To test individual devices, you can use the vic program or it text-mode
counterpart, victext, to interactively issue NI-VXI functions. You can
use the VXIin() and VXIout() functions or the VXIinReg() and
VXIoutReg() functions to test register-based devices by programming
their registers. If you have any message-based devices, you can send and
receive messages with the WSwrt() and WSrd() functions. Notice that
VXIinReg() and VXIoutReg() are for VXI devices only.
Finally, if you are using LabVIEW or LabWindows/CVI and you have
instrument drivers for the devices in your chassis, you can use the
interactive features of these programs to quickly test the functionality of the
devices.
What do the LEDs on the front of the VXI-MXI-2 or VME-MXI-2
mean?
The SYSFAIL LED shows the state of the VXIbus/VMEbus SYSFAIL
line. This line is asserted whenever any device in the chassis has not yet
passed its self test, if it has failed its self test, or if it has detected a failure
after originally passing its self test. The MXI LED indicates that the
VXI-MXI-2 or VME-MXI-2 is acting as a slave to another device on the
MXIbus, such as when the PCI-MXI-2 communicates with either the
VXI-MXI-2 or VME-MXI-2 or with another device in the chassis. The
VXI (VME) LED, when lit, indicates that the VXI-MXI-2 or VME-MXI-2
is acting as a slave to another device in the VXI (VME) chassis, such as
when a bus master inside the chassis wants to talk to either the VXI-MXI-2
or VME-MXI-2 or another device outside the chassis.