integrated-circuit
I don't have any experience in designing analog or digital ICs.
But from what I have read there must be a reason to call an IC analog or digital.
I have the following questions:
Does/Can an analog IC include any transistor which are operating in saturation region as switch?
Or similarly can a digital IC include any transistor which are operating in active/linear region?
Suggestion:
You don't really need the digital pot, the op amp to amplify the pot's output voltage, or the nice multicolor marker lines, to do what you require.
Explanation:
"DIMMING CONTROL (OPTIONAL) 1 ~ 10VDC or PWM signal : 100Hz ~ 3KHz" means the dimmer can be operated either by varying a DC analog voltage (Solution 1 below), or by varying only the duty cycle a PWM signal at your choice of frequency in the 100 Hz to 3 KHz range (Solution 2 below).
Solution 1:
Use a 10 volt regulated power supply such as a wall-wart, or even just a 9 Volt battery, and a potentiometer, in the following configuration:
A 9 Volt battery would be good enough for general use, the only constraint being it would reach only up to 90% of full brightness setting of the dimmer.
The center wiper contact of the potentiometer goes to the analog dimming input pin D+, and the negative side of the battery connects to one of the end contacts of the pot, and to the D- pin of the dimmer.
Solution 2:
Connect one of the PWM outputs of the Arduino, for example pin 3, 9, 10, or 11, to the PWM input pin D+ of the dimmer, and connect one of the GND pins of the Arduino to the D- pin of the dimmer. The default PWM frequency of the Arduino is approximately 490 Hz, within the acceptable range for your dimmer.
Set the dimming level you want, on a scale of 0 to 255, using AnalogWrite() in an Arduino sketch. By not changing any default frequencies, the operation of the Arduino will not be affected in any adverse way.
EDIT: Added Solution 3, from a Meanwell dimming thread on a discussion forum.
This solution is useful for Meanwell dimmers which only support the 0-10 Volt analog dimming method, and do not have a PWM option.
From the relevant post: This circuit will let you dim a D driver with the PWM outputs from the Arduino.
Notes:
In other words, the PWM duty cycle defines the brightness, regardless of the PWM frequency, within the allowable range of 100 Hz to 3 KHz. If your circuit runs from +5 only your signals must be between 0 and 5V, right?
If so, the easiest way might be to use a 74HC4066 + a 74HC4017 + a 74HC132 (to debounce the pushbutton and for reset). You can use 4 low-current LEDs and a single resistor to indicate which output is currently active.
The 5th output (Q4 if they're numbered from 0) goes to the reset input so that it only counts from 0..3 (for four outputs).. if you feed it through two of the remaining three gates, you can use another RC to reset the counter to 0 at power-up.
Best Answer
The answer to your first question is yes. Many analog IC's also have transistors and even outputs that act like a switch. An example that I'm dealing with at the moment is the BISS0001, a PIR control IC which can switch one of it's pins fully high or fully low, with no inbetween (pin 2).
The second question is also likely yes. On a "purely digital" IC, you're unlikely to find any non-digital outputs, but its almost certain that it has transistors within it that are performing non-saturating functions. What those functions might be is anyone's guess, but for example the 74ls04 had some extra transistors that deal with some sort of compensation (i think?).
The way you define analog and digital hardware is somewhat blurred, because the transistors that make up the "digital" hardware are fundamentally analog devices.