Continuously acquire data in MATLAB using callbacks and persistent variables - callback

Question

I have just recently started to use MATLAB to acquire data off of a data acquisition board and was in need of a function to acquire data continuously (i.e. until I ctrl^C out of the function). To do this I am using the data acquisition toolbox on a 32-bit windows OS.
Based on the documentation in matlab help and a few of the answers on this site, I found that after adding channels to my input handle I should:
set my 'SamplesPerTrigger' to Inf
set the 'TimerPeriod' to some value to trigger the 'TimerFcn'
set the 'TimerFcn' to some subfunction callback which appends data to a persistent variable
Is this a correct way to do this?
My code is as follows:
function acquire_arena_test(samprate,daq_device ,device_ID ,channels, saveroot)
setup.SampleRate = samprate;
setup.DAQdevice = {daq_device, device_ID};
setup.AIChannels = channels;
setup.SaveRoot = {saveroot};
ai = analoginput(setup.DAQdevice{1},setup.DAQdevice{2});
addchannel(ai,[setup.AIChannels]);
set(ai,'SamplesPerTrigger',Inf);
set(ai,'TimerPeriod',0.5);
set(ai,'TimerFcn',{#AcquireData,ai});
start(ai);
while(strcmpi(get(ai,'Running'),'On'))
pause(1)
end
stop(ai);
time = datestr(now,30);
save([saveroot time], 'data');
delete(ai);
clear ai;
function AcquireData(hObject, ~)
persistent totalData;
data = getdata(hObject);
if isempty(totalData)
totalData =data;
else
totalData = [totalData; data];
end
The initial analog input is definitely working properly. I have tried many permutations of giving the AcquireData callback to 'TimerFcn'. The error I receive is
`??? Error using ==> acquire_arena_test>AcquireData
Too many input arguments.
Warning: The TimerFcn callback is being disabled.
To enable the callback, set the TimerFcn property. `
Thanks in advance for any help.

Answer 1

I think the syntax you use for setting up your TimerFcn is wrong. You write
set(ai,'TimerFcn',{#AcquireData,ai});
but this means that your function AcquireData will be called with tree parameters: AcquireData(ai, event, ai) as explained here, which then of course triggers the error message since your AcquireData function only accepts two parameters. Just change your code to
set(ai,'TimerFcn',#AcquireData);
and it should work; the ai object is automatically passed as the first parameter (see the link to the MATLAB documentation above).

Answer 2

Sorry about answering my own question, but I figured it out. The trigger was not needed after all. Using a national instruments board (or a sound card, as it turns out) you can just change the LoggingMode to 'disk' and specify a file to save the .daq (data acquisition toolbox) file to save as with LogFileName. If you want to use the memory on your board, change the mode to disk&Memory. Helpful document:
http://www.mathworks.com/help/toolbox/daq/f12-16658.html
The script below acquires data during the pause, which is as long as you want it to be..
daqreset;
clear all;
ai = analoginput('nidaq','Dev1');
chans = addchannel(ai,0:6);
set(ai,'SamplesPerTrigger',Inf);
set(ai,'SampleRate',1000)
set(ai,'LogToDiskMode','Overwrite')
set(ai,'LogFileName','log.daq')
set(ai,'LoggingMode', 'disk')
start(ai)
pause()
stop(ai)
data = daqread('log.daq');
delete(ai);
Note that you still need to set 'SamplesPerTrigger' to Inf for this to work properly. Thank you to Jonas for his help as well.