lecroyscope

🤔 What is this?

This is an unofficial Python package to interface with Teledyne LeCroy oscilloscopes and read binary trace files (*.trc).

The parsing of trc files is based on the lecroy-reader project.

⚠️ Disclaimer

The features of this package are based on my needs at the time of writing. I have done very limited testing, using a single oscilloscope and a few trace files.

If you use this package, it is very possible you find a bug or some oversight. You are encouraged to make a pull request or to create an issue to report a bug, to request additional features or to suggest improvements.

⚙️ Installation

Installation via pip is supported. To install the latest published version, run:

pip install lecroyscope

To install the package from source, including test dependencies, clone the repository and run:

pip install .[test]

👨‍💻 Usage

📖 Reading binary trace files (*.trc)

from lecroyscope import Trace

trace = Trace("path/to/trace.trc")

Trace file header information can be accessed via the header attribute:

header = trace.header

# properties can be accessed directly
print("Instrument name: ", header.instrument_name)

# or as python dict
print("Instrument name: ", header["instrument_name"])

# header can also be converted into a python dict
header_dict = dict(header)
print("Header keys: ", list(header_dict.keys()))

The trace data can be accessed via the time(x) and voltage(y) attributes:

# time values
time = trace.time  # trace.x is an alias for trace.time

# channel voltage values
voltage = trace.voltage  # trace.y is an alias for trace.voltage

📟 Acquisition with LeCroy oscilloscope

import lecroyscope

scope = lecroyscope.Scope("192.168.1.10")  # IP address of the scope

# print some info
print(f"Scope ID: {scope.id}")

# change to "Sequence" mode with 200 segments
scope.sample_mode = "Sequence"
scope.num_segments = 200
print(f"Sample mode: '{scope.sample_mode}' with {scope.num_segments} segments")

# acquire data with a single trigger, timout (fail) after 60 seconds
scope.acquire(timeout=60)

# Read channel 2 and 3 traces
# The data in the scope won't change until next acquisition
trace_channel2: lecroyscope.Trace = scope.read(2)
trace_channel3: lecroyscope.Trace = scope.read(3)

# Alternatively, it is recommended to use the TraceGroup class for reading multiple channels from the same trigger
trace_group: lecroyscope.TraceGroup = scope.read(2, 3)
trace_channel2 = trace_group[2]
trace_channel3 = trace_group[3]
time = trace_group.time  # time values are the same for all traces