Principles of Automatic Alignment and Calibration Using Embedded Microcomputers

Alignment and calibration of any system manually or automatically can be reduced to a control problem; hence the powerful theories, rules, and methods of all areas of control engineering can help designers incorporate automatic alignment and calibration in systems with embedded microcomputers. This paper presents the very basic relationship between alignment/calibration and control theory. An example of zeroing an amplifier using a single chip microcomputer illustrates the proposed concepts.