Character Data Formats; Separators And Terminators - Chroma 63200 Series Operation & Programming Manual

6.3

Character Data Formats

For command statements, the <NRf+> data format permits entry of required characters. For
query statements, character strings may be returned in either of the forms shown in the
following table. It depends on the length of the returned string.
Symbol
Crd Character Response Data. They permit the return up to 12 characters.
Arbitrary ASCII Response Data. They permits the return of undelimited
aard 7-bit ASCII. This data type is an implied message terminator (refer to

Separators and Terminators).

6.4 Separators and Terminators
In addition to keywords and parameters, GPIB program statements require the following:
Data Separators:
Data must be separated from the previous command keyword by a space. This is shown in
examples as a space (CURR 3) and on diagrams by the letters SP inside a circle.
Keyword Separators:
Keywords (or headers) are separated by colon (:), semicolon (;), or both. For example:
LOAD:SHOR ON
MEAS:CURR?;VOLT?
CURR:STAT:L1 3;:VOLT:L1 5
Program Line Separators:
A terminator to inform GPIB that it has reached the end of a statement. Normally, this is
sent automatically by your GPIB programming statements. Termination also occurs with
other terminator codes, such as EOI. In this manual, the terminator is assumed at the end of
each example line of code. If it needs to be indicated, it is shown by the symbol <nl>, which
indicates "new line" and represents the ASCII coded byte as 0A hexadecimal (or 10 decimal).
Traversing the Command Tree:
The colon ":" separates keywords from each other which represents changes in branch
level to the next lower one. For example:
CONF:VOLT:ON 5
CONF is a root-level command, VOLT is the first branch, and ON is the second branch.
Each ":" moves the command interpretation downward to the next branch.
The semicolon ";" allows you to combine command statements into one line. It returns
the command interpretation to the previous colon.
Character Form
Introduction to Programming
6-3