Digilent Analog Discovery

Driver for the Digilent Analog Discovery 2 and Analog Discovery 3. A single connector exposes the device's oscilloscope, arbitrary waveform generator, power supplies, and 16-line digital I/O. Talks to the device through Digilent's WaveForms SDK (libdwf) via the pydwf Python wrapper.

Tier-2 free driver — distributed as a .muxdriver Python package.

Prerequisites

Install Digilent WaveForms on the host machine. It ships the native libdwf library that pydwf loads at runtime — without it the driver fails to initialise with a link to the download.

• Download: https://digilent.com/shop/software/digilent-waveforms/
• Supported devices: Analog Discovery 2, Analog Discovery 3

The pydwf Python package itself is installed automatically into the driver's per-driver venv on first activation; you do not need to pip install anything yourself.

Connector config

export default {
  driver: "Digilent Analog Discovery",
  config: {
    device_index: 0,           // Optional. Default 0 (first connected device).
    // device_serial: "210321ABCDEF",  // Optional. Open a specific device by serial.
  },
  methods: {
    acquire: { fn: () => driver.acquire() },
    gen_apply: { fn: (channel = 1) => driver.gen_apply({ channel }) },
  },
};

If both device_serial and device_index are set, device_serial wins.

Quick examples

Capture a waveform

const frame = await connector("scope").acquire();
// frame = { time: [...], ch1: [...], ch2: [...], sample_rate, samples, ts }
plot(frame.time, frame.ch1);

Generate a sine wave on W1, capture it on Ch1

const ad = connector("ad");

// Stage AWG settings, then push them.
ad.gen_ch1_function = "sine";
ad.gen_ch1_frequency = 1000;
ad.gen_ch1_amplitude = 1.0;
ad.gen_ch1_enabled = true;
await ad.gen_apply(1);

// Now capture and plot.
const { time, ch1 } = await ad.acquire();

Drive the power supplies

const ad = connector("ad");
ad.psu_pos_enabled = true;
ad.psu_neg_enabled = true;
ad.psu_pos_voltage = 3.3;       // AD3 only; no-op on AD2 with a warning
ad.psu_master_enabled = true;   // gates both rails

Stream live scope frames

const ad = connector("ad");
on("waveform", (frame) => plot(frame.time, frame.ch1));
await ad.acquire_continuous();
// ...
await ad.stop_continuous();

Properties

Identity (read-only)

Property	Type	Description
device_name	string	e.g. "Analog Discovery 2" or "Analog Discovery 3"
serial_number	string	Device serial
device_revision	string	Hardware revision (currently the device name)

Oscilloscope (osc_*)

Property	Type	Access	Unit	Description
osc_sample_rate	double	R/W	Hz	Sample rate
osc_buffer_size	int	R/W	samples	Samples per channel per acquisition
osc_ch1_enabled, osc_ch2_enabled	bool	R/W	—	Per-channel enable
osc_ch1_range, osc_ch2_range	double	R/W	Vpp	Input range (peak-to-peak)
osc_ch1_offset, osc_ch2_offset	double	R/W	V	Input offset
osc_trigger_source	string	R/W	—	none, ch1, ch2, ext1, ext2
osc_trigger_level	double	R/W	V	Trigger level
osc_trigger_edge	string	R/W	—	rising or falling
osc_ch1_waveform, osc_ch2_waveform	double[]	R	V	Last captured samples

Scope settings are staged in software and pushed to the device at the start of every acquire(), so the order of property writes doesn't matter.

Function generator (gen_chN_*)

Repeat for gen_ch1_* and gen_ch2_*:

Property	Type	Access	Unit	Description
gen_ch1_enabled	bool	R/W	—	Output enable (staged)
gen_ch1_function	string	R/W	—	One of dc, sine, square, triangle, rampup, rampdown, noise, pulse
gen_ch1_frequency	double	R/W	Hz	Output frequency
gen_ch1_amplitude	double	R/W	V	Peak amplitude
gen_ch1_offset	double	R/W	V	DC offset
gen_ch1_phase	double	R/W	deg	Phase
gen_ch1_symmetry	double	R/W	%	Duty / symmetry (0-100)

Generator settings are staged; call gen_apply({ channel }) to push them to the hardware and start (or stop) the output.

Power supplies (psu_*)

Property	Type	Access	Unit	Description
psu_master_enabled	bool	R/W	—	Master enable for both rails
psu_pos_enabled	bool	R/W	—	V+ rail enable
psu_pos_voltage	double	R/W	V	V+ rail voltage (programmable on AD3 only)
psu_neg_enabled	bool	R/W	—	V- rail enable
psu_neg_voltage	double	R/W	V	V- rail voltage (programmable on AD3 only)

AD2 vs AD3

The AD2 supplies are fixed at ±5 V — writing psu_pos_voltage or psu_neg_voltage on an AD2 logs a warning and is a no-op so the same connector config works on both devices. On an AD3 the writes take effect.

Digital I/O (dio_*)

Property	Type	Access	Description
dio_output_enable_mask	int	R/W	16-bit mask: bit set = pin is an output
dio_output_value	int	R/W	16-bit mask: value driven on output pins
dio_input_value	int	R	16-bit mask: value read from all pins

Static digital I/O only. Timed capture (logic analyzer) and timed output (pattern generator) are not yet exposed.

Actions

Action	Args	Description
acquire()	—	Single-shot capture of both channels. Returns { time, ch1, ch2, sample_rate, samples, ts }. Also emits the same payload on the waveform stream and updates osc_chN_waveform.
acquire_continuous()	—	Start a background loop that captures repeatedly and emits each frame on waveform. Idempotent — calling it again while running is a no-op.
stop_continuous()	—	Stop the continuous acquisition loop.
gen_apply({ channel })	channel: 1 or 2	Push the staged generator settings for one channel to the hardware. Starts the output if gen_chN_enabled is true, stops it otherwise.
reset()	—	Reset every subsystem and restore default scope / generator / supplies / DIO state.

Streams

Stream	Payload
waveform	{ time, ch1, ch2, sample_rate, samples, ts } — emitted by every acquire() (single-shot or continuous).

Limitations

• Logic analyzer / pattern generator not exposed. Static DIO only.
• Spectrum analyzer / voltmeter modes are not exposed as first-class properties. Acquire raw samples and post-process them in your script.
• Single device per connector. Multiple AD2/AD3s connected at once require one connector per device (use device_serial to pin them).
• External trigger sources (ext1, ext2) require the corresponding trigger I/O to be wired up; refer to the WaveForms documentation.