Data acquisition instrument architecture with flexible data acquisition, processing and display

DETAILED DESCRIPTION In accordance with the preferred embodiment of the present invention an electronic instrument includes instrument hardware.
A data acquisition engine schedules time sharing of the instrument hardware.
Channel objects act each as a client of the data acquisition engine.
The channel objects each included a channel buffer that contains data obtained from the instrument hardware.
Measurement objects are each a client of one of the plurality of channel objects.
Each measurement object processes data obtained from a channel buffer of a channel object to which the measurement object is a client.
In the preferred embodiment, display window objects are each a client of at least one of the plurality of measurement objects, each display window object displaying data processed by any measurement object to which the display window object is a client.
Also in the preferred embodiment, memory within the electronic instrument is allocated among object types to accommodate a user specified mix of object types.
The present invention provides a user with flexibility in allocating resources within an electronic instrument.