Experiment Controller Data File Format

The ECL emulator firmware and the ECBasic firmware (in transparent mode) output data in a binary format. On IBM-PC platforms the ExpRun program writes this data into files in the same format as it is sent from the controller, except that an information header is written at the beginning of the data file.

The file header is 14 bytes long and has the following format:

Byte Number	Byte Usage	Description
1	LSB Subject No	Subject number as entered in ExpRun
2	MSB Subject No
3	LSB Time	Start Time and date See discussion below
4	2nd Byte Time
5	3rd Byte Time
6	MSB Time
7	LSB Weight	Subject weight as entered in ExpRun
8	MSB Weight
9	LSB Box	Box number used in Exprun
10	MSB Box
11	LSB Prog ID	Program ID number not currently used (always 0)
12	2nd Byte Prog ID
13	3rd Byte Prog ID
14	MSB Prog ID

The date and time is stored as the number of seconds since 00:00 January 1, 1970. This is the return value of the time() function found in most "C" compilers. The localtime() function is commonly used to convert this value to a more usable structure.

Data items follow the header and are 6 bytes long. They have the following format:

Byte Number	Byte Usage	Description
1	Type	Event Type 1-8 are Currently used
2	Value	Event Value 0-255
3	LSB Data	Time in 1 millisecond ticks since program started or data value if type 7
4	2nd Byte Data
5	3rd Byte Data
6	MSB Data

ECL and ECBasic encodes these data records as follows:

Type	Value	Data	Description
1	1-48	Time	Turn on Output
2	1-48	Time	Turn off Output
3	1-8	Time	Input seen
4	1-255	Time	Marker
5	0	Time	Program Ends
6	1-5	Time	Timer Expired
7	0	Value	Send 32-bit Data value
8	0-255	Line Number	Error Number

Record type 5 marks the end of the data. There should not be any data records after the marker type 5, so you can use this as the "end of file" indicator.

Error Number	Probable Cause
0	Syntax Error
1	Illegal Variable Name
2	Constant Redefined
3	Variable redefined
4	Symbol table full - too many variables
5	Illegal Variable usage
6	Expression Missing
7	Variable not defined
8	Illegal use of string
9	Parentheses Balance Error
10	Improper Parameter Count
11	Internal Error - usually a bad instruction was encountered
12	Illegal Array Usage
13	Array not dimensioned
14	Illegal Array Subscript
15	Illegal Expression Type
16	NEXT without FOR
17	Improper Nesting of FOR/NEXT
18	Missing Argument
19	Subroutine Stack Overflow
20	Line number not found
21	Return without GoSub
22	Array Redimensioned
23	Illegal Expression Value
24	Break seen (control program terminated)
25	Stop command seen
26	Division by zero
27	Nesting too deep in FOR/NEXT
28	Out of Data in read command
29	Out of Memory
30	Dimension Too Large - Exceeded available memory

#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <time.h>
#include <string.h>
 
char infile[40];	/* input file name */
FILE *ipnt;		/* input file descriptor */
 
struct tm *localtime();
struct tm *time_ptr;
 
void put8( unsigned char, FILE * );
void put16( unsigned short, FILE * );
void put32( unsigned long, FILE * );
unsigned char get8( FILE * );
unsigned short get16( FILE * );
unsigned long get32( FILE * );
 
int main( int argc, char *argv[] )
{
	int i;
	int ibird,itype,idata;
	long oldtim;
	long bird_time;
	int weight;
	int box;
	unsigned long prog_id;
 
	if (argc<2)
	{
		while(1)
		{
			printf( "File name? " );
			fgets( infile, 20, stdin );
			if ( strlen( infile ) == 0 ) continue;
			break;
		}
	}
	else
	{
		strcpy(infile,argv[1]);
	}
	i = strlen( infile );
	if ( infile[i-1] == '\n' ) infile[i-1] = '\0';
 
	ipnt = fopen(infile,"rb");
	if(ipnt == NULL)
	{
		printf( "Cannot open %s\n", infile );
		exit( 1 );
	}
	oldtim = 0;
 
	ibird = get16( ipnt );
	bird_time = get32( ipnt );
	weight = get16( ipnt );
	box = get16( ipnt );
	prog_id = get32( ipnt );
 
	putenv( "TZ=EST0" );
	tzset();
	time_ptr = localtime(&bird_time);
 
	printf( "Bird #%d, Date: %d/%d/%d %d:%d:%d\n",
		ibird,
		time_ptr->tm_mon+1,
		time_ptr->tm_mday,
		time_ptr->tm_year,
		time_ptr->tm_hour,
		time_ptr->tm_min,
		time_ptr->tm_sec );
	printf( "Weight = %d, Box = %d, ID = %ld\n", weight, box, prog_id );
 
	while( feof( ipnt ) == 0)
	{
		itype = get8( ipnt );
		idata = get8( ipnt );
		bird_time = get32( ipnt );
 
		if( itype == 7 )
		{
			if (idata == 0)
			{
			    printf( "%3d      %ld\n", itype, bird_time );
			}
			else
			{
			    printf( "%3d %3d  %ld\n", itype, idata, bird_time );
			}
		}
		else
		{
		    printf( "%3d %3d  %ld,%ld\n",itype,idata,
					bird_time,bird_time-oldtim);
		    oldtim = bird_time;
		    if ( itype == 5 ) break;
		}
	}
 
	fclose( ipnt );
	return( 1 );
}

Bird #11, Date: 5/22/97 9:30:5
Weight = 11, Box = 9, ID = 1
  1   4  20,20
  4 100  22,2
  4   1  22,0
  1  28  22,0
  4   2  6022,6000
  1  21  6023,1
  4   3  12022,5999
  1  27  12023,1
  4   4  18023,6000
  1  26  18023,0
  4   5  24023,6000
  1  19  24023,0
  4   6  30023,6000
  1  23  30023,0
  3   2  31211,1188
  3   2  31418,207
  3   2  31586,168
  3   2  31725,139
  3   2  31860,135
  4   7  36022,4162
  1  22  36023,1
  4   8  42022,5999
  1  25  42023,1
  4   9  48023,6000
  1  24  48023,0
  4  10  54023,6000
  1  20  54023,0
  2   4  60023,6000
  1   2  60023,0
  2   2  63022,2999
  1   4  63023,1
  4 100  63024,1
  4   1  63024,0
  1  28  63025,1
  5   0  65867,2842