In May of 2013 Den wrote a PMC Autolocker because he ignored / didn't want to read anyone else's code. Later that year Yuta also wrote another one from scratch for the same reasons.

I tried to use both today, but neither one runs. Yuta's one doesn't run because he was using a bunch of private yuta library stuff in the yuta directory. That kind of programming style is pretty useless for us since it never works after some time.

So I re-activated and tested the PMCAutolock bash script (it is actually a symbolic link called "PMCAutolock" which points to AutoLock.sh). These scripts are all basically the same:

They turn off the loop (or turn down the gain) and then scan the PZT, look for a resonance, and then activate the loop.

One problem with the logic has been that turning off the loop makes the gain so low that the peak flashes by too fast. But leaving the loop ON and just sweeping with the gain turned down to -10 dB is also not good. That only reduces the UGF from 1 kHz to ~100 Hz. What we want is more like a 10 Hz UGF while scanning the length. SO, I edited the script to turn down the modulation depth on the EOM by that factor. After acquiring lock, it returns all settings to the nominal levels as defined on the PSL_SETTINGS screen.

I've tested it a few times and it seems to work OK. You can run it from the yellow shabang button on the PMC screen.

I also changed the .bashrc aliases for the MEDM command so that if you type medm_good at the command line you get MEDM screens with scalable fonts. So you can stretch the screens.