TimeSeriesStreaming.vi: LabVIEW program for reliable data streaming of large analog time series

With modern data acquisition devices that work fast and very precise, scientists often face the task of dealing with huge amounts of data. These need to be rapidly processed and stored onto a hard disk. We present a LabVIEW program which reliably streams analog time series of MHz sampling. Its run time has virtually no limitation. We explicitly show how to use the program to extract time series from two experiments: For a photodiode detection system that tracks the position of an optically trapped particle and for a measurement of ionic current through a glass capillary. The program is easy to use and versatile as the input can be any type of analog signal. Also, the data streaming software is simple, highly reliable, and can be easily customized to include, e.g., real-time power spectral analysis and Allan variance noise quantification.Program summaryProgram title: TimeSeriesStreaming.VICatalogue identifier: AEHT_v1_0Program summary URL:http://cpc.cs.qub.ac.uk/summaries/AEHT_v1_0.htmlProgram obtainable from: CPC Program Library, Queen's University, Belfast, N. IrelandLicensing provisions: Standard CPC licence, http://cpc.cs.qub.ac.uk/licence/licence.htmlNo. of lines in distributed program, including test data, etc.: 250No. of bytes in distributed program, including test data, etc.: 63 259Distribution format: tar.gzProgramming language: LabVIEW (http://www.ni.com/labview/)Computer: Any machine running LabVIEW 8.6 or higherOperating system: Windows XP and Windows 7RAM: 60–360 MbyteClassification: 3Nature of problem: For numerous scientific and engineering applications, it is highly desirable to have an efficient, reliable, and flexible program to perform data streaming of time series sampled with high frequencies and possibly for long time intervals. This type of data acquisition often produces very large amounts of data not easily streamed onto a computer hard disk using standard methods.Solution method: This LabVIEW program is developed to directly stream any kind of time series onto a hard disk. Due to optimized timing and usage of computational resources, such as multicores and protocols for memory usage, this program provides extremely reliable data acquisition. In particular, the program is optimized to deal with large amounts of data, e.g., taken with high sampling frequencies and over long time intervals. The program can be easily customized for time series analyses.Restrictions: Only tested in Windows-operating LabVIEW environments, must use TDMS format, acquisition cards must be LabVIEW compatible, driver DAQmx installed.Running time: As desirable: microseconds to hours