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The demand for fast evolution and increased flexibility of electronics systems has driven the trend for increasing software content of electronics systems. In measurement and automation, the prevailing trend over the past 20 years has been toward measurement instruments that define their capability through software. Virtual instrumentation, which emerged in the mid-1980s, has been at the forefront of this trend. Recently, the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) has articulated its desire for more flexible, software-based test systems through an initiative called synthetic instrumentation. This article will define virtual and synthetic instrumentation, and provide an example of building an RF synthetic instrumentation system with virtual instrumentation technologies.

Virtual instrumentation (VI) is defined as: A software-defined system where software based on user requirements defines the functionality of generic measurement hardware. A virtual instrument shares many of the same functional blocks as a traditional standalone instrument, but differs primarily in the ability of the end user to define the core functionality of the instrument through software. Where a traditional instrument has vendor-defined embedded firmware, a virtual instrument has open software defined by the user. In this way, the virtual instrument can be reconfigured for a variety of different tasks or completely redefined when an application's needs change. As will be discussed, a synthetic instrument is a type of virtual instrument; currently synthetic instruments are being defined specifically for RF stimulus and measurement within military test systems.

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