dt5800: Python binding of the DT5800 SDK

Control the CAEN DT5800 / DT5800D Digital Detector Emulator (Nuclear Instruments, front panel "DPPE") from Python: energy (fixed, spectrum, isotopes, sequences), pulse shape (fast exponential, digital RC, custom shapes, multi-shape), time base, pile-up and dead time, noise, interference, baseline drift, reset preamplifier, correlation of the two channels with the delay line, digital I/O, run control, waveform generator, Peltier, statistics and the signal monitor. The package calls the native DT5800 library (dt5800.dll / libdt5800.so) through ctypes. A built-in simulator (sim://) lets you develop and test without hardware.

Installation

pip install dt5800

The wheels for Windows x64 and Linux x86-64 / aarch64 (glibc 2.34+) include the native library. Python 3.8 or later. There are no mandatory dependencies: pip install dt5800[numpy] gets numpy arrays from the read functions with as_numpy=True. Every function also takes numpy arrays as input.

USB driver

The instrument is reached over USB 2 through its FTDI FT2232H and FTDI's D2XX driver:

• Windows: FTDI's CDM driver, installed by the DT5800 SDK setup (DT5800-SDK-Setup-<version>.exe) or downloaded from FTDI (any recent version works). It provides ftd2xx.dll, which the library loads at run time.
• Linux: the wheel includes FTDI's D2XX library (libftd2xx.so, next to libdt5800.so). The udev rule must still be installed. It gives every user access to the instrument and detaches the kernel's ftdi_sio driver from the DT5800 only. The rule is installed by the dt5800-sdk package (apt install dt5800-sdk / dnf install dt5800-sdk). It is also in the SDK sources: copy sdk/cpp/udev/60-dt5800.rules to /etc/udev/rules.d/, then run sudo udevadm control --reload-rules and plug the instrument in again.

dt5800.d2xx_info() tells which D2XX library was loaded, or why none could be. dt5800.supported_buses() lists Bus.USB only when it loads. Other FTDI devices on the same PC (USB-serial adapters, other instruments) are never opened: the library lists and opens only the devices whose USB description is a DT5800's.

Another build of the library

With the source distribution, or to use another build, point DT5800_LIBRARY at the library (full path of dt5800.dll / libdt5800.so). Otherwise the library is looked up in the package (dt5800/_native/), then by the system loader.

Quick start

import dt5800

print(dt5800.version())
for d in dt5800.enumerate(dt5800.Bus.USB):
    print(d.serial, d.address, d.description)

with dt5800.Device("sim://") as dev:            # or "usb://", "usb://<FTDI serial>"
    print(dev.info.model_name, dev.info.serial)
    ch = dev.channel(0)
    ch.set_energy_fixed(16000)                  # LSB, 0..32767
    ch.set_shape_exponential(dt5800.ShapeMode.AUTO, rise_ns=50, decay_ns=10000)
    ch.set_timebase(dt5800.TimebaseMode.POISSON, 10000)
    ch.enable()
    print(ch.stats())

Spectra come from files of the DT5800 software (load_values, process_spectrum), from the Spectrum Editor (spectrum_from_peaks), or from the isotope database (isotope_lines("Co-60"), spectrum_from_lines). Program them with Channel.program_spectrum.

Errors raise subclasses of dt5800.Dt5800Error (OutOfRangeError, InvalidParameterError, NoDataError, NotFoundError, DeviceTimeoutError, InvalidHardwareError, ...). Each one carries .status and .message (the text of dt5800_last_error).

Examples

The examples/ folder has a runnable script for each feature. Each takes the address as its first argument (default sim://):

pip install -r examples/requirements.txt
python examples/02_pulser.py usb://

Firmware

info = dt5800.firmware_file_info("DT5800D_2_4.NIU")
dt5800.fpga_update("usb://FT5800AB", "DT5800D_2_4.NIU",
                   progress=lambda stage, f: print(stage, f"{f:.0%}"))
# then power cycle the instrument

Documentation

User guide and API reference: https://public-repo.pages.nuclearinstruments.eu/dt5800/dt5800-sdk/

Source: https://gitlab.nuclearinstruments.eu/public-repo/dt5800/dt5800-sdk. MIT License.