Welcome to in-lux.

Not long ago interfacing an analogue IC (integrated circuit) to a 'microcomputer' was a simple task. Just wiring the IC to the address, data and control buses of the microprocessor and writing a few lines of code was sufficient.

Today, analogue IC's, processors and bus systems have become larger and more complex. Today the PC is standard and the standard interfacing bus thereof is the PCI bus ( needing its own dedicated 'processor'). And there are Application Specific Integrated Circuits (ASICs) specifically developed to assist interfacing to this bus.

In-lux is a project to promote instrumentation and interfacing of modern PCI bus mastering ASICs on Linux. In-lux is part of Basis Volume. The latter evolved from a company with worldwide reputation in sensor research and implementation. This site therefore follows this tradition and is geared to interfacing and sensor technologies in general. This site aims to occupy the areas of:

• evaluation of analogue interface cards and circuits for Linux 'computability'

• common sensor(s) algorithms testing and development with open source compilers and toolkits

• common sensor(s) and interface evaluation,

• Linux device driver development for popular bus-mastering and related ASICS,

• book reviews for texts on sensors, analogue interfacing, instrumentation and measurement .

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Why Linux:

GNULinux has many features making it ideal for instrumentation applications. It is fast, very stable, configurable, and is royalty-free. And over the last year Linux has attracted attention for embedded applications. Links to sites involved in this area are provided here.

Our focus is for Linux applied in analogue instrumentation. This site is thus dedicated to laboratory and portable instrumentation on Linux with the standard kernel. Thorough descriptions of Linux and resources are given on our companion user group (b-lux) site a link to which on the left:

How to Contribute:

1. In-lux/Basis Volume hopes to make a contribution to the open source movement by assisting in the development of GPL device drivers for modern busmastering ASICs used in analogue interfacing. 'Code Drivers' for these devices have up-to-now been in the proprietary domain. All are welcome to contribute. Contribution can be through our mailing list .

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