help please: event marker (communication with AcqKnowledge)

SuperLab SuperLab 4 Support
1

Hello!

I stumbled upon this and ran InstaCal, and all was fine. However, once I got to step 3, I realised I had no floppy.

I also found this thread and it seems that “With SuperLab 4, you do not need to install the Measurement Computing Support Pack separately – it comes included. The file is called “in-Measurement Computing.dll””.

I cannot find the appropriate dll file in my superlab folder; a pdb file exists in that name though (“in-Measurement Computing.pdb”). I don’t know what my next step should be to get the computers communicating so I can get event markers from Superlab into my BioPac hardware (MP100) into the AcqKnowledge software!

Any advice is greatly appreciated.

thank you!

Lindsay Chan
Research Assistant
Psychology Department
The University of Western Ontario

2

Hi Lindsay,

The “in-Measurement Computing.dll” is in the plug-ins folder. The surest way to find out if the installation is complete is to:

  • Create a new event
  • In the [B]Stimulus[/B] tab of the Event Editor, change the event type to Digital Output
  • Make sure the device is set to "Measurement Computing PCI-DIO24" (even if that's not the exact model that you have)
  • Click on the [B]Test Now[/B] button
If you do not get an error message, then the installation is complete and your Measurement Computing I/O device is being "seen" by SuperLab.

Hisham.

3

Hi Hisham,

Thanks for the speedy reply!
I did not receive an error message upon hitting the “Test Now”, so I think I’m on the right track.

I’m not sure if this is the right forum to address the issue if using AcqKnowledge specifically with Superlab, but I may as well throw the rest of my situation out there: I’ve set up external triggering in AcqKnowledge according to these instructions and everything seems well. When I went to run my experiment in Superlab (which was set up with the appropriate digital outputs as mentioned above), AcqKnowledge was still waiting for the trigger to occur. I let the experiment run to termination, and still… nothing.

What am I doing incorrectly?

Lindsay.

4

Alas, I don’t have any experience with AcqKnowledge.

In InstaCal, check that your I/O card is set to board number 0. Sometimes, board no. 0 happens to be a “virtual” (i.e. non-existent) board that’s automatically created by the Measurement Computing software.

5

Hi Hisham,

Happy new year!

Yup, the I/O card is set on board no. 0.
Here’s a screenshot of the specifics of my digital output event:

Still, nothing.

I’m forwarding a copy of this to the support folks over there as well.

Lindsay.

6

Happy new year to you as well!

Please check for the board number in InstaCal, Measurement Computing’s own software, not in SuperLab.

7

Hi again,

Sorry - I should’ve specified that the screenshot was how I had set up the digital output event, with all of the lines (0-7) checked off.

As highlighted in the screenshot below, the board in InstalCal indeed is set to 0. (Should I be concerned that the Device (I assume what dev stands for) is 10?

8

The dev# should not matter, only the Board#.

You have everything setup correctly on SuperLab’s end. For testing purposes, try making the pulse duration 500 ms instead of 50, inter pulse duration of 200 ms, and repeat the pulse 10 or 20 times. This will give you time on the AcqKnowledge side to look for the pulse and set things up correctly (a single 50 ms is easy to miss).