Programming Fundamentals 5
N9310A User’s Guide 95
Command Statement Rules Overview
Besides the standard notation of SCPI described in previous 
page, SCPI uses the following rules:
• Command statements read from left to right
• Use either long form or short form of keywords, but do 
not use both
• no separating space between the keywords, only use a 
colon to separate keywords of different levels
• always separating a keyword from a variable with a space
• always separating a variable from its unit with a space (if 
variable has a unit)
Take “:AM:DEPTh <val>” for example, 
Using Valid Commands
The following examples demonstrate valid and invalid 
commands.
:DEPTh
sp
value
No separating space here
This is a separating space
:AM
:
Example 1
:FREQ:CW 900 MHz
In this example, the keyword short form is used. The command is 
correct and will not cause errors. 
It is equivalent to front panel key access Frequency > 900 > MHz