Technical Glossary

4DGL

A high-level programming language designed for the EVE core to develop embedded graphics applications. It bears similarities with C and Pascal making it easy to understand.

4D Programming Cable

A USB to Serial-TTL UART converter cable. The cable provides a fast and simple way to connect all of the 4D devices that require TTL level serial interface to USB.

4D-UPA

A universal programmer designed to work with multiple 4D Systems display modules.

ADC

Analogue to Digital Converter. A device that receives an analogue signal, such as an electric current, and converts it to a digital binary format that computers and microcontrollers can understand.

ASCII

American Standard Code for Information Interchange. Standard ASCII uses the last 7 bits to represent all standard English letters, numbers and symbols. Extended ASCII includes the first bit to indicate accented characters and other symbols.

BACK CONTACT

A metallic layer that covers the entire back surface of a solar PV cell and acts as a conductor.
Also used to refer to advanced cell designs, such as EWT, where both terminals of the cell are located on the back side of the wafer, thereby increasing the light-gathering area of the cell and improving conversion efficiency.

BACK GLASS

The bottom layer of a thin film solar module provides rigidity and electrical insulation. Current is extracted from the module through the junction box, which is attached to the circuit via a hole in the back glass.

BACKPLANE

In TFT-LCD manufacturing, the backplane is the array of thin-film transistors that control the light output of each pixel on the display.

BAUD Rate

Or simply baud. It is the maximum oscillation rate of an electronic signal. It can be used to measure data transmission speeds if the number of bits per pulse is known.

Bit

Binary Digit. It is the smallest unit of measurement of computer data. It has a value of either one or zero.

Byte

A unit of measurement of computer data that is equal to 8 bits. It can hold a value of 0 to 255.

Byte Array

A consecutive sequence of bytes. Serial commands to and from 4D Systems displays are sent as byte arrays.

Char

Character. A letter, number, punctuation, space or symbol sent or received to and from a computer or microcontroller. When using an ASCII, a single char is equivalent to a byte.

Checksum

A value used to check the integrity of a file or data transfer. In 4D Systems products, it is computed by XOR’ing the first byte to the rest of the bytes in the byte array. It is always the last byte in the byte array.

CLB

Cover Lens Bezel. A type of 4D Systems display that integrates the bezel to the display panel in a single piece of glass.

CMD (Genie)

Command. Tells the display what command to execute. It is always the first byte in the byte array.

CMD (Windows)

Command Prompt. The Windows equivalent of a Linux Shell Terminal.

Comm Port

A serial communication port used to connect devices such as your display.

Device Driver

A particular form of software application that is designed to enable interaction with hardware devices. Without the required device driver, the corresponding hardware device fails to work.

Embedded System

A programmed controlling and operating system with a dedicated function within a larger mechanical or electrical system, often with real-time computing constraints. It is embedded as part of a complete device, often including hardware and mechanical parts.

EMF

Electromagnetic Field. It is a field with electrical and magnetic properties produced by accelerating electric charges in an environment. It can affect electronic devices and cause them to malfunction.

EMI

Electromagnetic Interference. It is the result of an EMI acting on a device, causing it to malfunction.

ESD

Electrostatic Discharge. A sudden and momentary flow of electric current between two or more electrically charged objects caused by contact. It is one of the potential causes of malfunction in electronic devices.

Event (Genie)

An occurrence of an action upon an object, especially that from an external actor.

FAT16

Or simply FAT, File Allocation Table. It is a file format used by DOS and Windows that keeps track of file fragments on a storage device. It uses 16 bits to identify each cluster and is limited to 4GB per partition. This is the format used by SD cards in 4D Systems Displays.

FAT32

An improvement over FAT16. It uses 32 bits to identify each cluster and can have partitions of up to 16TB (only up to 2TB in Windows 10). This is the default file system of flash storage devices such as thumb drives and SD cards.

Female Header

A connector attached to a wire, cable, or piece of hardware, having one or more recessed holes with electrical terminals inside.

FFC

Flat Flexible Cable. An extremely thin and flat ribbon-like cable used to connect various electronic components in small form factor devices. The gen4 lineup uses a 30-pin FFC.

Firmware

A specific class of computer software that provides the low-level control for the device’s specific hardware.

Flash Bank

Erasable and programmable user memory interfaces are in a Diablo chip that can be used to store programs and smaller project components, such as inherent widgets and fonts.

Flash (storage)

Erasable and programmable user memory interfaces are in a Diablo chip that can be used to store programs and smaller project components, such as inherent widgets and fonts.

FPC

Flexible Printed Circuit. Are circuit boards printed on a thin, flexible material? They bear similarities to FFC but generally have better signal integrity, impedance control and thermal performance. FPC are used to connect the main board to the display panel.

GPIO

General Purpose Input Output. It is an umbrella term used to indicate the programmable pins in an integrated circuit. Microcontroller boards and Single Board Computers generally refer to Digital and Analogue pins as GPIO.

GTX TOOL

Genie Test Executor debugger. A tool used to check the data sent and received by the display.

GUI

A form of user interface that allows users to interact with electronic devices through graphical icons and visual indicators such as secondary notation, instead of text-based user interfaces, typed command labels or text navigation.

Header

A cluster of pins combined in a single form factor forms a single connector. Female headers have recessed holes while male headers have protruding pins.

HEX

Hexadecimal. A numbering system with base 16 is used to represent binary data. A byte is represented with two hexadecimal digits, where 0 is 00 while 255 is FF in hexadecimal.

Host

A microcontroller, microprocessor or computer board that executes the main processes in an embedded system.

I2C

Inter-IC bus. A Serial, 8-bit oriented protocol developed by Philips Semiconductors (now NXP) that is a half-duplex, multi-master and multi-slave communication protocol that only requires 2 bus lines: the Serial Data Line (SDA) and the Serial Clock Line (SCL).

Image Files

Graphics files are generated upon program compilation and should be saved to the micro SD Card.

Inherent Widget

Widgets that can be used in Diablo and Pixxi modules that do not require a micro SD card. They are stored in Flashbank 5 of Diablo and the external flash of Pixxi displays.

Internal Function

These are system functions that are built into the core of any 4D Systems Graphics Processors.

Internal Widget

Widgets are built into the core of Diablo and Pixxi Graphics Processors. They reside in the system block and do not use any external storage.

IPS

In-Plane Switching panel. An active matrix LCD screen technology developed by Hitachi as an improvement over TN technology that provides more uniform colour reproduction and greater viewing angles than TN technology. IPS panels, however, typically require more power than TN panels.

LSB

Least Significant Byte. The lowest value byte. It is the two HEX digits on the right in a 16-bit integer.

Matrix (button)

A group of buttons in ViSi and ViSi-Genie, wherein only one can be active at a time.

MCU

Microcontroller Unit. A chip that contains processing core(s), memory and programmable input/output peripherals designed for embedded applications.

Micro USB cable

A type of cable used to connect the display to a computer.

microSD Card

A type of removable flash memory card used for storing information.

MSB

Most Significant Byte. The highest value byte. It is the two HEX digits on the left in a 16-bit integer.

OBJECT INSPECTOR

A section in Workshop4 where the user can change the properties of a certain widget. This is where the widgets customisation and Events configuration happen.

Parameter (Genie)

These are values that contain information about the command. They are sent after the Command byte. The number of parameter bytes depends on the type of command byte that precedes them.

PCB (Printed Circuit Board)

Are boards made out of polymer, ceramic or composite materials with etched traces of conductive material that connect different electronic components designed to function as complex circuits with a minimal footprint.

PmmC

The PmmC contains the low-level micro-code information (analogous to that of a soft silicon) which defines the characteristics and functionality of the PICASO processor. The chip-resident 4DGL functions are part of the PmmC configuration file, and future proofing and enhancements are available via PmmC updates. The PmmC file is programmed into the module via the COM port.

Processor

A small chip that resides in the 4D Systems displays. Its basic job is to receive input and provide the appropriate output.

Programming Adaptor

Used for programming 4D Systems display modules, interfacing to a breadboard for prototyping, and interfacing to Arduino and Raspberry Pi interfaces.

PWM

A method of simulating an analogue signal through digital means by varying the wavelength of each pulse to simulate the desired average amplitude.

RAM

A volatile type of memory used by the processing core to temporarily store data during the execution of a program or application.

RAW (imaging)

An image format that is uncompressed and unprocessed. Images in this format are accessible at the binary level; however, each pixel can range in size from 8 to 24 bits, making images in this format significantly larger than those in other formats.

RAW (storage)

A type of storage without a file system that is accessed at a binary level.

Resistive Touch Panel

A touch-sensitive computer display composed of two flexible sheets coated with a resistive material and separated by an air gap or microdots.

RGB (Red, Green Blue)

A computer’s native colour space for capturing and displaying native colours electronically. Modern colour formats include RGB565 (16-bit, Hi Colour), RGB888 (24-bit, True Colour) and ARGB8888 (32-bit, True Colour with Transparency).

RS232

Recommended Standard 232. A Serial Communication Standard developed by the Electronic Industry Association and the Telecommunications Industry Association (EIA/TIA) for use between a host system and a peripheral system. A logical “high” is between 5v and 15v for the sender and 3v to 15v for the receiver, whereas a logical “low” is between -15v and -5v for the sender and -15v and -3v for the receiver.

RS485

Recommended Standard 485. An electrical standard for serial communication developed by the Electronic Industry Association and the Telecommunications Industry Association (EIA/TIA) for balanced signalling between multipoint systems. It allows long-distance digital communications and is resistant to electromagnetic interference. As it only defines electrical characteristics over the physical layer, other standards define the communication protocols over the link.

Slave

A device that acts upon the information sent by the host and may or may not send feedback. Slave devices may execute minor independent processes in a more complex system.

SPI

Serial Peripheral Interface. A synchronous, full-duplex, typically single-master (main), multiple-slave (subnode) serial communication protocol with either 3 or 4 wire interfaces. SPI supports higher transfer rates when compared to I2C and U(S)ART.

TN

Twisted Nematic panel. A type of display that uses nematic liquid crystals between two polarising glasses that “twists” the polarisation of light passing through when a voltage is applied. TN panels have poor viewing angles and colour accuracy, but consume less power.

U(S)ART

Universal (Synchronous) Asynchronous Receiver Transmitter. A serial communication interface that allows transmission of binary data over short distances between devices. Asynchronous mode, which is the typical implementation, does not require clock signals and only uses 2 data lines (TX, RX) for communication. For Synchronous mode, see SPI.

uUSB-PA5-II

A USB to Serial-TTL UART bridge converter designed to work with 4D Systems display modules. It provides the user with multi-baud rate serial data up to 3M baud rate.

WIDGET

Graphical objects in Workshop4.

WYSIWYG

What-You-See-Is-What-You-Get. The Graphics Editor Section in Workshop4, where the user can drag and drop widgets.