To enable users to quickly put together a study of phenomena, a few control and readback elements have been incorporated into a common interface.
For example, a curve tracer for transistor CE output characteristics requires
A ) Base current setting : A parameter that only needs to be set once per curve
B) Collector voltage setting : A parameter that needs to be swept from Voltage A to voltage B
C) Collector current monitoring : A parameter that needs to be read for each value of B
In addition, the user may require plotting and analytics.

Here's a video of our impression of what such a utility should look like ( LabView(TM) is ideal for such an audience, but there seem to be no FOSS alternatives to it yet ).
Diode IV is being plotted based on the following schematic. CH3 monitors the voltage drop across the diode, and (PV1-CH3)/1K is the current flowing through it.

The derived channel section can also be used to add I2C sensors, and some thought needs to be put into adding an analytics section