NIDays event brings NIWeek to Boston

Boston, MA. National Instruments is taking a version of its annual NIWeek event on the road by presenting NIDays at four U.S. cities. The Boston version convened yesterday with NI business and technology fellow Mike Santori describing innovation in a platform-based world.

Indeed, our world, he said, has transformed into a huge programmable system, to which many terms have been applied: the Internet of things, for example, or, in Germany, Industrie 4.0. It's a world populated by smart systems, smart factories, M2M capabilities, and ubiquitous sensors, all accompanied by big data, and all of which might fit under the label “cyberphysical systems,” which, Santori said, are areas of intense research at NI.

Special-purpose devices are going away, Santori said, being replaced by virtual implementations. Windows and Intel-based hardware offered a standard platform in the personal computer space, and HTTP/HTML offered a standard software platform for the World Wide Web, he said, and a similar evolution has taken place in measurement and control. The NI LabVIEW RIO architecture, he said, is the platform on which virtual instrumentation is built.

Following Santori's introductory comments, NI technologists provided a condensed yet intense overview of products introduced over the three days of NIWeek 2013 held in Austin in August, including NI LabVIEW 2013. If you missed EE-Evaluation Engineering's earlier coverage of NIWeek 2013, visit the links below:

As is the case at NIWeek, NI partners were on hand at yesterday's Boston NIDays event.

IBM was on hand to highlight its work with NI to dissolve the barriers between design and test, helping companies more accurately identify defects early in the development cycle, reduce product design errors, incorporate improvements quickly, and ultimately deliver high-quality, safe products. See “Vehicle Measurements Extend from Serial Buses to Powertrains” for more details on the collaboration between IBM and NI.

Bloomy Controls highlighted the fact that it was recognized as offering “Most Outstanding Technical Resources” at NIWeek 2013. The award goes to an NI alliance partner with the most NI-certified LabVIEW and TestStand developers and architects. The company, which has been an alliance partner for over 21 years, was also chosen as a finalist for “Regional Partner of the Year—Americas” award.

MAC Panel was on hand to highlight its SCOUT next-generation mass interconnect system, which reduces integration time and improves signal integrity. The company's offerings include a 28-slot interface that can be mounted on an NI PXI 1045 chassis. With SCOUT, the company said, complex PXI ATE can be integrated in a matter of hours, compared with weeks for conventional approaches.

Virginia Panel emphasized its iSeries connectors, which were designed to meet the changing demands for dependable, maintenance-free connections for test-and-measurement equipment. The iSeries make up a smaller scale connector family compared with the company's standard 90 Series but take advantage of the firm's current contact technology.

NI subsidiary Measurement Computing highlighted several products it introduced recently, including new handheld standalone temperature and humidity loggers. The USB-600 devices start at $135 and feature an LCD that presents real-time data; alternatively onboard memory can log up to 250k readings.

The company also highlighted high-speed, OEM-ready DAQ boards. The USB-2600 Series are priced from $799; they provide 1 MS/s sampling, Up to 64 16-bit analog inputs, 24 digital I/O lines, four counters, and up to four analog outputs.

Finally, the company highlighted the BTH-1208LS—a Bluetooth-based data acquisition device designed for the tablet and smartphone market. It offers multifunction operation, Android and Windows device driver support as well as Bluetooth connectivity, and it is powered by rechargeable batteries. Demo apps for the BTH-1208LS are available free from Google Play.

For more partner news from the August NIWeek event, visit these links:

NI will hold two additional NIDays events in the U.S. this year.