Agilent Technologies has introduced the Instrument Control Framework (ICF) software component.
The ICF is designed to make it faster and easier for third-party software to enable and control Agilent liquid-chromatography (LC) systems in chromatographic data systems or workstations.
Based on new standard instrument drivers from the company, the ICF eliminates much of the delay and effort associated with software developers using low-level instrument control codes to write their own native drivers.
Agilent is providing the ICF to software developers at no cost.
The ICF contains the company's 1200 Series LC RC.Net instrument drivers and provides a simple programming interface for third-party software connectivity.
The third party simply develops an adaptor from their own software to the ICF to gain full control of current, future and some older Agilent LCs, with no need to write additional instrument control code.
Features of the ICF software component include: the support of Agilent's 1100, 1200 and 1290 Infinity LC series modules; a high-level interface, which is said to be easier to use than current low-level LICOP component support; a combined system view, which provides better system status than module-specific views; a user interface, which includes high-value functions such as method editing, instrument status and instrument configuration; and a simple update routine, which enables the fast and simple support of new modules and enhancements.
The ICF provides instrument control without the need for a deeper knowledge of underlying hardware and firmware.
The software component also provides integrated online help, facilitates localisation into a variety of languages and accommodates method audit trails.
