NEXIV Reference Guide

When you open AutoMeasure, you'll see a collection of panels arranged around the screen. Each panel has a specific job. Once you know what each one does, the software stops feeling overwhelming.

Video Panel

The Video Panel is the live camera view — what the NEXIV's optics are currently looking at. This is where you'll see the part under the lens in real time.

Inside the Video Panel there are two Setting Areas:

Area	What It Controls
Setting Area 1	Zoom level, illumination type (diascopic/episcopic/ring), light intensity
Setting Area 2	Detection method (edge, blob, gray), image filters, measurement point detection sensitivity

DRO Panel (Digital Readout)

The DRO Panel shows the stage's current X, Y, and Z position in real time. Think of it as your GPS coordinates on the machine.

You can also type a coordinate directly into the DRO to move the stage to that position — useful for jumping to a known location quickly. Just click the axis field, type the value, and press Enter.

Main Panel

The Main Panel contains the primary action buttons — Start, Stop, Replay, Teach, and mode toggles. This is your control center for starting and stopping measurement runs.

List Panel

The List Panel shows all the measurement steps (macro codes) in the currently open teaching file. Each row is one measurement step. You can:

• Click a row to highlight it in the Graphics Panel
• Double-click to edit that step's parameters
• Right-click for a pop-up menu (insert, delete, copy, run single step)
• Color-coded rows indicate pass (green), fail (red), or not yet run (gray)

Measurement Result Panel

After a replay, results appear here. There are two views:

View	What You See
Detail	Individual feature results — nominal value, actual value, deviation, tolerance, pass/fail
Result Table	All features in a grid — good for scanning a full part at a glance

Each result shows an OK or NG (No Good) judgment based on whether the measured value is within the programmed tolerance.

Graphics Panel

The Graphics Panel shows a 2D graphical representation of your measurement results overlaid on the part geometry. Features are drawn as shapes — circles, lines, points — color-coded by pass/fail status. This gives you a quick visual map of where the part is in and out of tolerance.

Guide Panel & Information Panel

The Guide Panel shows context-sensitive help for the currently selected macro code — what it does, what parameters it expects, and any warnings. The Information Panel shows system status messages and error codes in real time.

AutoMeasure uses .nmp files (teaching files) to store measurement programs. Everything — the sequence of steps, probe settings, tolerances, lighting — is saved in the .nmp file.

Opening a File

Saving a File

Use File → Save File to overwrite the current file, or File → Save As to save a copy with a new name. Save As gives you two dialog options — Application-unique (Nikon's browser) or Windows standard.

Appending a Teaching File

File → Append Teaching File chains a second .nmp file to the end of the currently open one. This lets you build modular programs — one file per part section — and combine them at runtime. You specify X and Y offset values so the appended program runs in the correct location relative to the first.

Recent Files

File → Recent NMP File shows your last-opened files for quick access. Saves time when you're switching between parts frequently.

Printing Results

Use File → Print to print the current measurement results. Print Preview shows what each panel will look like before printing — you can choose to print the List Panel, Result Panel, or Graphics Panel independently.

The Edit menu is where you modify the measurement steps in your teaching file. Most of these operations work on selected rows in the List Panel.

Undo & Retry Measurement

Edit → Undo reverses your last edit. Edit → Retry Measurement re-runs the last measurement step — useful when you want to check if a borderline result is repeatable without running the whole program again.

Insert & Delete

Select a row in the List Panel, then use Edit → Insert to add a new step before it, or Edit → Delete to remove the selected step. You can also right-click directly in the List Panel for the same options.

Copy (Translational, Rotational, Mirror, Lattice)

AutoMeasure's copy functions are powerful for repetitive part layouts:

Copy Type	When to Use It
Translational	Copy steps offset by X/Y — same features repeated at a different position (e.g. same hole pattern, different row)
Rotational	Copy steps rotated around a center point — bolt hole circles, radially symmetric features
Mirror	Copy steps mirrored across an axis — left/right symmetric parts
Lattice	Copy steps in a grid pattern — arrays of identical features (e.g. 4×6 hole grid)
Recall	Copy steps from another open teaching file into the current one

Shift & Move

Shift offsets selected steps by a fixed X/Y/Z amount — useful when a fixture was repositioned. Move is interactive — it lets you drag steps to new positions visually in the Graphics Panel.

Run (Single Step)

Edit → Run executes only the currently selected step, without running the entire program. This is the standard way to test a single measurement during development — make a change, run that step, verify the result, move on.

Search and Replace

Edit → Search and Replace finds a specific value or parameter across all steps and replaces it. Common use: changing a tolerance value that appears in 20 steps — do it once instead of 20 times.

Batch Edit

Edit → Batch Edit lets you change a parameter (illumination, zoom, tolerance, probe type) across multiple selected steps simultaneously. Select all the steps you want to change in the List Panel, open Batch Edit, and apply the change to all of them at once.

AutoMeasure can measure a wide variety of geometric features. Each feature type has its own macro code in the teaching file. Here are the most common ones:

Point

A single X/Y/Z coordinate. Used to locate a specific spot on a part — a hole center, a corner, a surface location. Points are the building blocks for almost everything else.

Line

Defined by two or more points along a straight edge. AutoMeasure fits a best-fit line through the detected edge points and reports the line's angle and position.

Circle

The most common measurement on a vision CMM. AutoMeasure detects the edge of a circular feature and fits a best-fit circle, reporting diameter, center X/Y, and roundness deviation. Requires a minimum of 3 measurement points around the perimeter.

Arc

A partial circle — useful for measuring radii on corners, fillets, or partial bores. Works like circle measurement but only spans a defined angular range.

Rectangle

Measures a rectangular feature by detecting all four sides. Reports length, width, position, and squareness.

Distance

The distance between two previously measured features — two points, two lines, a point and a line, etc. You don't measure distance directly; you measure the features first, then calculate distance between them.

Edge Detection

All of the above rely on edge detection — the software finding the boundary between light and dark in the camera image. The detection sensitivity is controlled in Setting Area 2 of the Video Panel. For clean, high-contrast edges (machined metal on white background), default settings work well. For low-contrast parts, adjust the threshold or switch detection method.

Vision AF (Auto-Focus)

Vision AF measures Z height by analyzing image contrast — it moves the Z axis until the image is sharpest, then records that height as the Z measurement. Used for surface height, step height, and flatness. No contact with the part required.

In AutoMeasure, a "probe" is the method used to acquire measurement points. You choose the probe type when setting up each measurement step. The right probe depends on what you're measuring and what the part looks like.

Probe Type	How It Works	Best For
Basic Probe	Detects a single edge point at the crosshair location	Simple point measurements, manual teaching
Average Probe	Takes multiple edge detections and averages them	Noisy edges, textured surfaces
Circle Probe	Automatically detects points around a circular feature	Holes, bores, pins — fastest way to measure circles
Scan Probe	Continuously acquires points along a path	Lines, arcs, profiles — high point density
Arc Probe	Detects points along a defined arc	Partial circles, corner radii, fillets
Square Probe	Detects four sides of a rectangular feature	Rectangular holes, slots, pads
Crosshair Probe	Places a measurement point at the exact crosshair position	Manual point placement, arbitrary locations
Vision AF Probe	Uses image contrast to find focus (Z height)	Surface height, step height, flatness
Laser AF Probe	Uses a laser to measure Z height (requires laser hardware)	Reflective surfaces, low-contrast materials
Train Probe	Pattern matching — teaches a template image and finds it	Finding a specific feature by appearance
Search Probe	Searches an area for a pattern match	Locating features with positional variation
Blob Probe	Detects and measures a region of pixels (blob)	Area measurement, presence/absence detection

Selecting a Probe in Teaching Mode

A measurement without a tolerance is just a number. Tolerances are what turn measurements into pass/fail judgments — the foundation of inspection.

Setting Tolerances on a Feature

Each measurement step in the List Panel has tolerance fields for each output value. For a circle, that's typically diameter (± tolerance), center X (± tolerance), center Y (± tolerance).

Output Item Settings

Edit → Output Item Setting controls which values get written to the results file and printed. You can turn individual outputs on or off per feature — useful when you only care about diameter but not position, for example.

Understanding OK / NG Results

Result	Meaning	Display Color
OK	Measured value is within tolerance	Green
NG	Measured value is outside tolerance	Red
— (dash)	No tolerance set — result is informational only	Gray
E (Error)	Measurement failed — could not detect the feature	Orange/Red

What Happens on NG

By default, AutoMeasure pauses on an NG result and waits for operator input. This behavior is controlled by the SET ERRORJUDGE command:

Setting	Behavior
SET ERRORJUDGE 0	Pause and wait for operator input (default)
SET ERRORJUDGE 1	Skip to the next measurement step automatically
SET ERRORJUDGE 2	Skip to the next sample/workpiece automatically

Measurement Errors vs. Judgment Errors

AutoMeasure distinguishes between two types of errors:

• Measurement Error (SET ERRORMEAS) — The machine could not acquire the measurement at all. The feature wasn't found, the edge wasn't detected, or the image was too blurry. This is a hardware/setup problem.
• Judgment Error (SET ERRORJUDGE) — The measurement was acquired successfully, but the value is outside tolerance. This is an inspection result — the part may be out of spec.

Handle these separately. A measurement error needs investigation (lighting, focus, part placement). A judgment error is just a failing part — the machine is working correctly.