Dragonfly Programmer

Before updating a Dragonfly or Hummingbird using the Dragonfly Programmer it is important to create a backup of its settings, the programming process can erase some of the settings. A script can be created and used in HGL Acquisition Terminal to record all these settings. Below is an example script, the file extension needs to be .hgl for it to be used by Acquisition Terminal. 

Once you have a script, open HGL Acquisition Terminal, located in the HGL Software directory on the C drive. Uncheck 'Stop on error response', then click the ellipsis next to 'Run Sequence of Commands' a windows explorer prompt will appear, navigate to and select the script created earlier. This will send the commands to every card connected to the PC. We recommend to only do one Hummingbird at a time when running the script, this prevents mistakes when reapplying settings.  Below the results will be output, copy the results into a notepad and save that as the name of the Hummingbird or Dragonfly, we will use this later to see if the flashing caused any of the settings to be lost. Not all updates clear the settings but some do. 

Now that a copy of the settings is saved, move the firmware versions into the programming folder, by default this is located at C:\HGLTemp\Programming\. The extension of the program files is required to be .prog, if the firmware files do not have that extension rename the file. We recommend to only have the files of the firmware that the user wants to flash in the folder, this prevents the programmer from potentially flashing an older or wrong version onto the unit. 

Open Dragonfly Programmer, all the connected units will populate on the screen showing their parent, current versions, serial number, and IP address. Near the bottom of the screen, select the versions that will be flashed onto the card. The software will default these to the newest versions found in the programming folder. If the version shown in the drop down matches the version that is currently on the card the software will skip it when programming. The user can also tell the software which firmware to flash and which one to skip by toggling the program switches, green will attempt to program, yellow will skip programming. We recommend flashing the Base Card first and if the Daughter Card has updated run the programming software a second time to update those. 

Once all the settings are set, select start programming, programming can take a long time depending on what is being flashed.  DO NOT REMOVE POWER OR CLOSE THE PROGRAMMER WHILE IT IS IN PROCESS. Doing so could result in the the hummingbird or dragonfly losing its ability to communicate and will need to be returned to HGL to have the firmware re-flashed. During the Programming the statuses will be 'Programming...', 'Verifying...', then 'Resetting...'. 

Once the status has returned to Idle it is safe to close the programmer. Now we can check to see if any settings were lost by returning to Acquisition Terminal. The script from earlier can be ran again to compare outputs, if everything matches then no changes will need to be made. If some settings were blanked use Acquisition Terminal to reapply those settings. To apply settings to the Hummingbird with Acquisition Terminal select the target card from the drop down and using the backup created earlier send the commands in the format like the example below. After applying all the settings 'NSAV' saves all the information to the device.

  • ID MF32-210396
  • PCBID 1856-013a
  • MAC 70:B3:D5:02:11:D2
  • PARENT HUM32-200811
  • SYSCHAN 1
  • PCHANS 32
  • CHMAP 1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8
  • NSAV