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Video displays are the conduit for real-time alphanumeric and graphic measurands and processed data. Local area networks and the Intranet expand the domain of displays beyond the operator’s console so that each user can view data of interest in a meaningful manner independent of others. Telemetry streams can produce too much data for a single person to comprehend as alphanumeric information. Displays ease the task of interpreting raw measurands faster than the eye can fathom, depict when measurands are within safe and meaningful limits, show relationships between measurands, and spot trends. To assist these efforts, telemetry ground systems developers like L-3 developed a wide variety of customizable display objects, including strip charts, bar charts, vertical meters, round gages, cross plots, and annunciators, as well as tabular displays, orientation displays, and bit maps.
Each display type can easily be tailored with respect to size, foreground and background colors, fonts, grids, time and data format, etc. To speed comprehension, data can be presented in engineering units, as opposed to raw transducer output. The attributes of the object can change as the color of a curve or numeric value changes when a measurand approaches or is out of limits. In addition to processing algorithms, which detect changes, large time scales make it easier to visualize trends. Dynamic 3-D models of objects under test can be used to show orientation, as opposed to interpreting a table of numeric orientation values. And multiple objects can be grouped into a single window to form instrument panels.
Windows can be created for a test plan that is used over and over either with the same measurands and processed parameters or with new ones as required. Each version can be renamed and saved. Measurands and parameters can be changed in real time. Similarly, attributes such as limits can also be changed. Standard drawing and graphics tools are useful in creating process diagrams and embellishing control panels. The detail and complexity of displays is left entirely to your creativity.
Snapshots of events can be sent to color printers or saved to disk for inclusion in reports. Features such as local disk and ring buffers associated with video displays, and independent of system archiving, give operators the ability to recreate data leading to an event of interest.
