Stories/PaulRoussin

Paul Roussin, Engineer - Inficon Inc.

I am bragging about J at work. We manufacture residual gas analyzers and I am working on ways to analyze the spectrums within the production unit ( as opposed to an offboard worksation), so it can send back composition information, rather than raw mass spectral data. I've written a few programs using J which has turned a few heads. I like to show it off. To get all the vacuum systems etc. out of my office, I use J to connect via the local network to a computer in the lab which is connected as a server to the residual gas analyzers via an rs232c serial link. Thus I can send commands from J in my office to have the server aquire scans and return them to J. I can process and plot the data just as fast as the RGA can aquire the mass spectrums. Many years ago, I enjoyed APL, and though I am quite ignorant in J-speak, I manage to do some very powerful things with it such as curve fitting, FFT's, etc.