Instrumentation & Measurement Magazine 25-8 - 16

The IEEE Technical Committee
10-The Waveform Generation,
Measurement, and Analysis
Committee: Update 2021
Luca De Vito, John Jendzurski, Sergio Rapuano, William B. Boyer,
Jerome Blair, and Nicholas G. Paulter, Jr.
T
he IEEE Technical Committee 10 (TC-10), the
Waveform Generation, Measurement, and Analysis
Committee of the IEEE Instrumentation and
Measurement Society (IMS), supports the advancement of
industries and other entities that research, develop, manufacture,
and use technologies and instruments that generate or
acquire signals. These signals are ubiquitous and used in many
technologies, such as, but not limited to, communication,
computing, transportation, medicine, entertainment, manufacturing,
and agriculture. The TC-10 work, therefore, impacts
everyone. Because the TC-10 is a developer of documentary
standards, the TC-10's goal is achieved by fulfilling, as best as
possible, the global need for standardized terms, test methods,
and computational methods that are used to describe and measure
the parameters that describe the performance of signal
generators and waveform recorders and analyzers. The TC10
has developed and maintains the following documentary
standards: IEEE Std 181-2011, Standard on Transitions, Pulses,
and Related Waveforms [1]; IEEE Std 1057-2017, Standard for
Digitizing Waveform Recorders [2]; IEEE Std 1241-2010, Standard
for Terminology and Test Methods for Analog-to-Digital
Converters [3]; IEEE Std 1658-2011, Standard for Terminology
and Test Methods for Digital-to-Analog Converters [4]; IEEE
Std 1696-2013, Standard for Terminology and Test Methods for
Circuit Probes [5]; and IEEE Std. 2414-2020, Standard for Jitter
and Phase Noise [6]. Additional information on these standards
and the TC-10 can be found in [7], [8].
The TC-10 comprises over 50 members from around the
globe, with the majority in Western Europe and the United
States. The members are an international group of electronics
engineers, mathematicians, professors and physicists with
representatives from national metrology laboratories, national
science laboratories, component manufacturers, the test
instrumentation industry, academia, and end users. Developing
standards in the fields of the TC-10 means being at the
forefront of the transfer of knowledge from research to manufacturing
and vice versa.
There currently are three active projects within the TC-10.
One focuses on the revision of the IEEE Std 1241, another on
16
the revision of the IEEE Std 1658, and the third on the revision
of the IEEE Std 1696. The activities and status of these three
projects are described here.
Per the Project Authorization Request (PAR), the official
IEEE-Standards Association (SA) document authorizing the
revision of the analog-to-digital converter (ADC) standard,
IEEE Std 1241-2010, the PAR approval date was 30 June 2016,
which is the official start date of the revision. However, the active
and earnest revision of the IEEE Std 1241 did not start until
the " restart " meeting of 29 June 2021. A kick-off meeting had
occurred previously to the restart meeting but changes in the
1241Working Group (1241WG) leadership precluded any actual
start of a revision. Prior to the restart meeting, potential
participants were identified and contacted, and a call for participation
was announced by the IEEE-SA. These responses
established the 1241WG membership, which comprises about
20 people from around the world.
Since the restart meeting, significant progress has been
made in the revision of the Std 1241. The Std 1241 is a long document,
about 130 pages comprising 14 technical clauses, three
informative annexes, and one normative annex. The 1241WG
decided to collectively address the revision by sequential review
of the clauses and annexes. This review-and-revision
process was achieved by members of the 1241WG providing
comments and suggesting changes to the document on a
regular, nominally monthly, interval. These comments were
the basis for discussions during the 1241WG meetings, which
have occurred almost monthly since the restart meeting. All
meetings, thus far, have been web-based. By the end of 2021,
the 1241WG had reviewed, revised, and corrected most of the
Std 1241-2010 up to Clause 14. The text of several clauses was
revised, updated and/or corrected, algorithms were corrected,
and figures were updated. For the Std 1241, being largely a test
method standard, significant changes were not deemed or
determined necessary at this time. However, there was a significant
number of minor revisions, changes, and corrections
to the Std 1241-2021 but no single significant modification. The
Std 1241 PAR expiration date is 31 December 2022. Depending
on the progress in finalizing the draft of the Std 1241 for
IEEE Instrumentation & Measurement Magazine
1094-6969/22/$25.00©2022IEEE
November 2022
Instrumentation & Measurement Magazine 25-8

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Instrumentation & Measurement Magazine 25-8
