Definition of Software Architecture in Support of Virtual Instrumentation

"The test community, in attempting to solve test systemsobsolescence issues, has been searching for ways to isolate testprograms from specific knowledge of test resources. This testprogram decoupling from resource specific knowledge is referredto as instrument independence or instrument interchangeability.Several Commercial and Department of Defense (DoD) entities haveand are working on the issue. Currently, no standardized orcommonly accepted solution for completely providing thecapability has emerged. The software community has madeadvancements in technologies that lend themselves to this need.One such technology is the Common Object Modeling (COM) standard.COM provides a methodology for defining software components in away that hides the component implementation from users. The useris only required to know the interface defined, the way tocommunicate to the object, not the specifics of how the componentdoes its job. There is a direct correlation between the need tocommunicate with instrumentation without knowing specifics of theinstrumentation and the need to utilize components withoutknowing how they perform their functions. This proposal definesan approach to achieving complete test system instrumentinterchangeability through a robust, comprehensive architecturaldefinition and implementation, using modern softwaretechnologies, paradigms, and standards.BENEFITS: The results of this project will provide an element for use in test s