Joe Jasniewski

Jim, Thanks for the reply. I'm certain that it is the small project aspect of what I do that has enabled me to get by with less than an optimal technique. Generally, I am going it alone. However, I would like to leave a legacy of readable, maintainable code, by anyone minimally trained in the art. This has actually led me to avoid the use of "the latest and greatest" functionality available. On the other hand, I dont want to be crippled should I come across code where someone used all the latest stuff; I look at it and realize I have no idea what's going on. So to all the advanced LabVIEW programmers out there, what's the next step, generally, past the "state machine" in general program archetecture? Can anyone say "well, I'd make use of notifiers, then semaphores, then rendevous and I think the value of "first time run?" is obvious" this might help me with the next set of specific LabVIEW functions to study. As far as the Object Oriented stuff, at this point I dont know the difference between a Function and a Life-Cycle. I'm sure I could guess by analogy, but my question was more directed at the specific "Advanced" functions provided by NI on the Functions palette, relative to programming methodology. If these are the elements that allow OOP and you have to know or have studied OOP to be able to grasp what they do conceptually, knowing that would help me too. Best Regards,

I have not "kept up" with the latest advances in how to structure a program in LabVIEW. My greatest evolutionary jump was to embrace the state machine form and force myself to think in terms of a state queue and state variable cluster. So I have been coding away watching versions 6, 6.1 and now 7 go by. I seem to be doing just fine, without using any of the alternative archetecture functions. By these I mean basically ALL the program structure functions under Advanced- -Semaphore -Occurrences -Notification -Queue (NI's implementation) -Rendezvous -First Call Does anyone have an opinion on what the NEXT evolutionary jump would be after the embracement of the state machine archetecture? If more than one, what would be the order of importance, from your own experience or in general? Does anyone have or could recommend a course, book titled something like "LabVIEW Advanced programming - Beyond the state machine"? Subtitled: "How not to let your technique sink right out of sight, as LabVIEW evolves" or "For those who have neither the time nor inclination to tinker with every single element provided on the Functions palette, until they have a clear understanding of what it does and how to use" Best Regards, Joe Jasniewski