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Motion-sensor tester runs from a browser.

Article Excerpt
By Sean O'Leary and Jed Marti, Artis

A microcontroller and free test tools let engineers operate the tester from anywhere.

Automated test stations don't always need proprietary test tools. Using a microcontroller, a PC, and free software tools, we developed an automated test station to test and align motion sensors. Test engineers can operate the system from any Web browser in the company network and can also check the status of a unit under test or retrieve data on a previously tested sensor module.

The motion-sensor module is an optical sensor that uses illuminating LEDs and focused detectors to sense moving objects. The module uses one bank of LEDs to illuminate a target and another bank of 32 detectors to sense motion. The sensor's output is a bit vector indicating the current state of each detector. The outputs of many such sensors are assembled into a profile of the moving object for identification by a pattern-matching system.

To function properly, the...

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