User`s guide

Introducing the Universal Library

Congratulations and thank you for selecting the Universal Library (UL). We believe it is the most

comprehensive and easiest-to-use data acquisition software interface available anywhere. As easy as

Universal Library is to use, significant documentation and explanation is still required to help new users get

going, and to allow previous users to take advantage of all the package's powerful features.

The fast changing nature of the software industry makes it very difficult to provide a totally up to date user

guide in written form. Adding to this complexity are the new features and functions that are constantly being

added to the library. To provide the most complete information possible and at the same time keep the

information current, the Universal Library documentation is offered in four parts:

 Universal Library User's Guide: The User's Guide provides a general description of the UL, offers an

overview of the various features and functions, and discusses and how they can be used in different

operating systems and languages. The User's Guide also provides board-specific information relating to

the features and functions that are included with the Universal Library.

 Universal Library Function Reference: The Function Reference contains detailed information about

the Universal Library functions, usage, and options. This document is available on our web site at

www.mccdaq.com/PDFmanuals/sm-ul-functions.pdf.

 Example programs: The examples programs demonstrate the use of many of the most frequently used

functions, and are valuable learning tools. They are written for many popular languages. Each example

program is fully functional, and provides an ideal starting place for your own programming effort. You

can cut and paste from the example programs to create your own programs. It's easier to cut-and-paste

pieces from a known, working program than to start writing everything from scratch.

 Readme files: The best way to get the latest, most up to date information is through Readme files. We

incorporate this information into our documentation as quickly as we can, but for the latest, greatest

information, read the Readme file.

Universal Library overview

The Universal Library is the software that you need to write your own programs for use with any of

Measurement Computing‘s data acquisition and control boards. The library is universal in three ways:

Universal across boards: The library contains high level functions for all of the common operations for all

boards. Each of the boards has different hardware but the Universal Library hides these differences from your

program. So, for example, a program written for use with one A/D board will work "as is" with a different

A/D board.

Universal across languages: The Universal Library provides the identical set of functions and arguments for

each supported language. If you switch languages, you will not have to learn a new library, with new syntax,

and different features.

If you are programming for the .NET framework, you will find that the Universal Library for .NET has the

same "look and feel" as the Universal Library for 32-bit windows applications, and is just as easy to program.