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Creating and Running Scripts

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Tom Willemsen edited this page Apr 23, 2020 · 4 revisions

Scripting > Creating and Running Scripts

Types of Scripts

Creating and running instrument scripts

Different instruments may have specific scripts that are required for multiple users. To make accessing these easier, genie_python loads instrument scripts at startup.

Creating scripts

For the most part, this is the same as creating-user-scripts.

Script module

For instruments where a single file is sufficient, instrument scripts should be placed in C:\Instrument\Settings\config\[MACHINE_NAME]\Python\inst.py.

For instruments with complex scripts which need more than one file, you should put your scripts in the inst folder, for example C:\Instrument\Settings\config\[MACHINE_NAME]\Python\inst\my_functions.py.

When using a multi-file inst module, to make the functions available under the inst namespace as inst.do_thing() as opposed to inst.my_functions.do_thing(), you will need to add the special file __init__.py. Anything which is imported into this file (using normal python import statements) will be available under the inst namespace.

Script structure

Everything in the instrument scripts will be executed when genie_python is started. This includes - Making functions available to be called later - Setting variables - Running methods. Typically, most code in instrument scripts will be contained within functions (procedures in Open GENIE language), but it's important to be aware that anything that isn't will be included too. For example, if an instrument script is loaded:

a = 1
def print_a():
    print str(a)

then the user can call print_a, but they can also use the variable a, and change its value, which may not be desirable. If instead the script was:

def print_a():
    a = 1
    print str(a)

then the user could only access print_a() and the value could not be changed.

To reload the inst module, for instance if you had updated the script or added a new script, you should issue the command reload(inst).

Running

Please note: When you are running scripts, the script is being executed on the instrument control PC. This means that the script itself has to be stored on the instrument control PC. It also means that any path names in your scripts refer to locations on the instrument control PC (unless you are referring to network drives).

Once the script is loaded, anything from the script will be available using the inst package reference. For instance if your script contains the function my_function you can call:

inst.my_function()

Whilst using the scripting perspective in the IBEX GUI, users will also benefit from the same auto-complete feature as they do with genie_python commands.

Creating and running user scripts

Creating scripts

  1. First, we need to create a script file. By default, user scripts should be placed in C:\scripts. Navigate to your desired directory and create the script file with extension .py.
  2. Write some genie_python!
  3. Save the file

We have glossed over step 2 because Python is a very powerful scripting language. Combined with Open GENIE, the potential scope of a script is enormous, and well beyond the scope of this guide. For example though, here is a simple script that executes a calibration run.

# Change the title
calibration_run_title = "Calibration run 1, 29th September"
g.change(title=calibration_run_title)

# Begin the run
print "Beginning calibration run : " + calibration_run_title
g.begin()

# Wait for 100 uamps
g.waitfor(uamps=100)

# End the run
g.end()
print "Calibration run finished successfully"

Running

Please note: When you are running scripts, the script is being executed on the instrument control PC. This means that the script itself has to be stored on the instrument control PC. It also means that any path names in your scripts refer to locations on the instrument control PC (unless you are referring to network drives).

Once you've created your script, it's time to run it. There are a number of ways of launching a Python script.

From IBEX

  1. Launch the IBEX GUI
  2. Navigate to the scripting perspective
  3. Run the command g.load_script("C:\path\to\script\my_script.py") where the path and script name are updated appropriately
    • Note that if you omit the absolute path to the file (i.e. C:\path\to\script) then genie_python will look in the current script directory. By default this is C:\scripts but can be viewed and set with the commands g.get_script_dir() and g.set_script_dir() respectively.
  4. When the script is loaded, any procedures in the script will be run automatically. If the script contains any function, you will now be able to call them from within the scripting window.

From a genie_python terminal

  1. Launch a genie_python terminal from C:\Instrument\Apps\Python\ by running genie_python.bat
  2. Follow the above starting at step 3.

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