The remote communication channel between a host and the RCU is encrypted using TLS. Each ATECCGEN2 rack has a default private key and a public certificate. To communicate with the rack the host must have the TLS public certificate, which can be obtained from the RCU via FTP service. The RCU is also password protected, meaning a password is required for communication via API. Each rack has a unique default password, which you should change for security purposes.

Default Host Name

An application uses NI-ATE Core to control a rack identified by the host name or IP address of the rack. The rack host name is ni-rmx-1010x-<serial> where <serial> is the serial number of the RCU. If the serial number has less than eight characters, 0 characters are inserted before the serial number to produce the minimum length of eight characters.

The example 7-digit serial number 217D902 produces a host name of ni-rmx-1010x-0217d902

Default Password

The default password is unique and generated based on the serial number of the RCU. The default password consists of eight hexadecimal characters (0 to 9, a to f, lower case). If the serial number has less than eight characters, 0 characters are inserted before the serial number to produce the minimum length of eight characters.

The example 7-digit serial number 217D902 produces a default password of 0217d902.

Changing the Password

Call ChangeRackPasswordAsync to change the password. You must provide the existing password and the new password. The new password takes effect once the existing password is verified.

Remembering Passwords

When connecting to a target rack for the first time using the CreateAteCoreSessionAsync function, you can instruct the NI-ATE Core driver to save the password you use to connect by setting the rememberPassword parameter to true. After you set rememberPassword to true, NI-ATE Core uses the previously saved password when connecting to the target if you pass an empty string as the password parameter on subsequent connections to the target.
Note The saved password is stored securely on the host machine and is not accessible by other users of the same machine or other host machines.

You can also use the PasswordManager class function SetSavedPasswordAsync to save a password for a specified target or update the target password if you already saved one.

Setting or Changing a Saved Password

PasswordManager passwordManager = new PasswordManager(); 
try 
{ 
	// Change saved password 
	await passwordManager.SetSavedPasswordAsync(hostname, password); 
} 
catch(Exception ex) 
{ 
	Console.WriteLine(ex.Message); //Print the exception message. 
} 
finally 
{ 
	if (passwordManager != null) 
	{ 
		// To close the session. 
		passwordManager.Dispose(); 
	} 
}

Deleting Saved Passwords

You can delete a password saved to a target rack by calling the PasswordManager class function DeleteSavedPasswordAsync. You must provide a password when connecting to the target rack using CreateAteCoreSessionAsync after deleting the saved rack password.

Deleting a Saved Password

PasswordManager passwordManager = new PasswordManager(); 
try 
{ 
	// Delete saved password 
	await passwordManager.DeleteSavedPasswordAsync(hostname); 
} 
catch(Exception ex) 
{ 
	Console.WriteLine(ex.Message); //Print the exception message. 
} 
finally 
{ 
	if (passwordManager != null) 
	{ 
		// To close the session. 
		passwordManager.Dispose(); 
	} 
}

Generating TLS Private Key and Public Certificate Pairs

Call GenerateAndApplyCertificateKeyPairAsync to generate new key pairs. The RCU generates and applies a new private key and public certificate pair and returns the new public certificate to the host. You must reboot the rack and create a new session for the new key pairs to take effect.

Manually Retrieving the Effective Certificate

In the event of a key pair mismatch you can copy the effective certificate to replace the public certificate on the host. You must also complete this process when you have generated a key pair and you want to control the rack from a new host, or you want to reinstall NI-ATE Core driver software.

  1. Retrieve the effective certificate from the RCU via FTP at the following path: /upload/tls_cert.pem.
  2. Rename the certificate to ni_ate_core_cert.pem.
  3. Move the certificate in the following folder: C:\ProgramData\National Instruments\NI-ATE Core\.
  4. Delete ni_ate_core_cert.pem.new from the same location, if it exists.

You can now use the API to generate a new key pair.