Smart Flow Computer with Auto-Calibration and Advanced Communication
Ivan Marić · Microcomputer applications · 1999
Due to the major progress in the technology of electronic communications, new approaches are being imposed on the design of contemporary measuring instruments. Measuring instruments are becoming part of global communication network capable of responding to orders issued by remote clients. The possibility of the remote communication enables the considerable minimization of measuring instrument hardware with no performance degradation. The paper describes the realization of a smart flow computer meeting the imposed requirements. The advanced communication preserves the functionality of the flow computer despite the reduced hardware. The flow computer carries out all the complex calculations, and leaves the remote computer to only handle the messages and to deal with the visual interpretation of flow computer options and data. The flow computer achieves high measurement accuracy by performing periodic 3-point auto-calibration of the analogue subsystem. By building communication software for the client/server mode of operation and by using the distributed component object model, flow computers are becoming available across the internet/intranet.