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Application Note
www.tektronix.com/courseware8
Data Collection & Report Generation
Documenting lab exercises and creating lab reports is a
significant challenge for both students and educators. If
printed lab manuals are used, often lab results are just
response boxes filled with numbers which may not necessarily
reflect the student’s true understanding of the material. If
drawings are required, students may resort to duplicating
waveforms by hand which can take an unnecessarily long time
and may not truly represent what the student obtained as a
result. With digital oscilloscopes, screen captures are also an
option but then students are required to paste those images
into a document. Often, with multiple documents submitted
by multiple students the lab reports will have different formats
making the grading process more difficult.
The TBS1000B-EDU includes various tools that streamline
the reporting process. When performing labs using the
courseware system, students can easily switch between the
courseware application and the oscilloscope application using
a “Data Collection” option on the instrument. Using the step-
by-step instructions, students can set-up the scope to see
the desired waveform and then save the results using screen
captures. For tracking, the scope provides the option of
associating the captured information with a specific step in the
procedure. When the lab is complete, the student can then
automatically create a lab report comprised of all of the screen
captures taken during the lab. The oscilloscope generates
an HTML file and a folder that contains the screen capture
images. The report includes the lab name, the student’s ID,
the date and screen images annotated with the step number
assigned when the image was captured. To turn in the report
the student can save the files to a USB drive and upload
them onto a server or .zip the file and folder together and then
submit it by e-mail. The reports are generated in a standard
format which makes it easier to review and can provide a
clearer indication on how well the student understands the
material.
Figure 7. Data collection includes the feature of assigning results to specific steps of
the lab experiment.
Figure 8. Generate an HTML lab report from the data collected.