Grampa_of_Oliva_n_Eden

Ben,

thanks for the quick reply, and that makes sense, but debugging this would be a new area for me, any tips on how i could determine if it is? and how to fix it? (or can you point me to some documentation that may help?)

thanks again Chris

Trouble shooting intermitant problem is not easy particularly if I can't see the code (not implying I want to ).

As I wrote above I was just guessing at it being a race condition since globals are wonderful for demonstrating them.

The best I can do now is (and it will sound drastic) recomend you wrap all of the functionality associated with that reference in an Action Engine with an approriate set of actions so that the the reference never leaves the AE but is used exclusitvely in the AE.

Here is the Nugget I wrote on AE's if you are curious.

http://forums.ni.com/ni/board/message?board.id=170&message.id=240328#M240328

Ben

Hello all I have a very strange problem that I am not sure what category it falls under

When I modify a vi (details below) it runs fine on my development box for hours...the development box runs dual core centrino with windows xp.

When i transfer the same modified VI to my server it will run for about 5 minutes or so and then labview instantaneously closes with no windows or error messages popping up. there are also no error messages when labview is restarted. the server has 8 core xeon processor and is running windows server 2003.

I am wondering if the additional cores is causing a problem related to labview trying to multi-thread the vi using all cores? so when it try's to divide the code and run in parallel it is messing with the vi timing somehow?

The modification to the vi is below:

Unfortunately i cant send the entire vi, but this snippet sits in a wait loop and monitors an open adodb connection, this connection must stay open for very long periods (it is part of a web portal) and the DB will time out the connection at times.

the ado get connection properties vi is monitoring the adodb connection and if the db drops the connection the true statement reestablishes it. The db connection and error outs are wired to a large loop that is monitoring for events related to date time. I would think this wiring should force the two to be run serially but i am not sure...

If this snippet is disabled or deleted from the VI it runs fine

Does anybody out there have any ideas or perhaps know of another reason labview maybe shutting down on its own? and why it would work fine on the "smaller" box but not the server?

Any help would be greatly appreciated

thanks Chris

With the limited data I can only guess that the Global holding the reference is suffering from a race condition.

Ben

Hi,

In my VI, I use a Gauge control with a digital display so user can either move the needle or input the value in digital display. In my VI I use an event structure to get the update value.

If I use the value changed event, when I move the needle it will generate the event continously. I don't want this happen, I just want the latest value.

So I tried to use the mouse up event, then it didn't generate the event if I update the digital display.

I have an idea with using a seperate numeric control for digital display and have 2 event seperately. But I think this is a costly solution. Is there any simpler way to solve this?

Best regards,

Thang Nguyen

See here for Ton's Nuget on dynamice events.

http://forums.ni.com...=242266#M242266

I can't attach an example or image but I'll try with words.

USe Dynamic events to register for the value change (you will be shutting this on and off so its dynamci).

In your event strture create the following events

Mouse donw or Mosue enter >>> Re-register the value change against a ref contant ( this shuts down value change events while in the guage)

Mouse Up or Mouse Leve >>> re-register against the guage... use property node value to read the value and write it to the value(signal) property to fire the value change event.

If you put it together right it should only update the guage when you release the mouse and it will fire when you use the digital control.

Have fun,

Ben

Edit:

When I started to reply this thread had no replies. By the time I delt with questions at my desk and completed my reply, I found a pile of replies. I did not intend to duplicate the earlier suggestion.

...

That is so totally the issue here - not wether climate change is happening, but that the data is being skewed by both sides to their own ends.

Wouldn't it be great if we all looked at the data and could understand it so that didn't have to "beleive" anything? Now we're starting to get into the world of religion

That sounds like you are coming around to the point I was was making earlier, Scientist and Engineers fill the societal gap previously filled by clergy. "The numbers" are our "bones", "entrails" etc. We are looked too by society to help them decide what is truth and what is fiction. If this is goes on too long and is never closed with a definative answer, the religion of "science" will be called into question.

Quoting from Winston Churchill ( The Second World War Vol 4 "The Hinge of Fate" pg 53) where he wrote;

"There is no worse mistake in public leadership than to hold out false hopes soon to be swept away."

So the earlier we get this over with the better off the science types will be.

Ben

I agree that this is the major issue that nobody is talking about.* Regardless of the ultimate cause of climate change, be it natural or man-made, or our specific political leanings, these scientists have clearly violated the public trust through their manipulation of the scientific process. From withholding data (in clear violation of the law) from people who might be critical of their work to threatening peer review publications as a way to prevent them from publishing contrarian viewpoints, these guys blatently overstepped the bounds of good science. This is completely and totally inexcusable. I've long been on the fence regarding human-induced climate change, but these emails cast a long shadow across climate change proponents. They also, unfortunately, reflect very poorly on the entire scientific community.

(*I did find one very good article where a climate researcher acknowledges the mistakes of the CRU.)

[Later]

After reading a bit more it appears the emails may not be the most condemning part of the hacked information. That would be what appears to be a readme file ("Harry_Read_Me") containing notes by a programmer working on the code of their mathematical model. There's a story on the CBS blog here.

Thank you very much for that post!

You expressed my thought better than I could.

Going forward...

1) As Scieintist and engineers our collective integrety may be has been threatened.

2) I only see self-governance of our actions as a readily available mechanism to prevent further potential incidents.

3) We can urge our counter-parts to "come clean" and let them expose their errors.

4) We can do a better job of teaching what are the limitaions of our science.

5) We can speak out to those around us to help the general public come to understand that our works are subject to question and change over time (as we learn more) so SCIENCE can not be viewed as an absolute by which we can develop rules and and laws tht govern us.

Paul,

I want to thank you for breaking the ice on this topic. YOU are a better man than me.

Ben

OCG!!!! One part of the Internet says it's true, another says it's false! What is the world coming to?!?! Who should we beleive?!?!

Ok - I'll bite - tell us why it's a scam. What's in it for the scientists that say it's true? ...and don't forget to include (preferrably reputable, if that's at all possible) references.

A couple of ideas come to mind, sorry but no references to back me up.

1) ".... so this topic further investigation." or something to that effect is what I was taught is how all research papers should end. The explanation that came with that note to me is that nothing gets researched without funding and there will be no funding without a reason so ... more research dollars.

2) "Power" durring recent climate hearing in congress all of the pro-change people were scheduled early so that teir version would make the news before it was too late to go to press. The con arguement was little covered.

3) "Power" the meeting that is scheduled for helsinky (spelled very badly, sorry) include provision to enforce climate regualtions on a global scale effectively setting the first hints of a World Government with power to enforce climate laws.

4) No mention of atomic energy in all of the "solutions" unless we happen to be talking about a country other the the US and then it is OK fro them but not us.

5) According to an interview given by Lord Monkton (again bad spelling) indicated that they predicted phenomenon on which global warming was based (CO2 concentration increase inhibits radiating heat) has been measured using new satalite data and was shown to be false.

Just trying to help, and am full aware of how crazy i sound but still desire to help any one willing to read.

Ben

"Climategate". And to think this wasn't even a word a month ago. Stock up on the popcorn. IMO this is the biggest scam in history. I've believed this for years, but now the story has legs. Seems the Internet wasn't the only thing Al Gore "invented". If we can't trust scientists to be honest ...

I can't find the old LV Champions blog but I did write an entry to address the great responsibility that we carry in modern society. I also mentioned this particular issue in this post from a year and a half ago;

http://lavag.org/topic/7352-earth-hour/

(See post #18).

In the blog I can not find I tried to cast the role of engineers and scietist of today playing the roles of "high priest" in earlier generations, where once the "people" turned to the high-preist to settle what is truth and what is not, now they turn to us.

So it is important for each of us to "do the right thing" whenever the "bones are cast into our laps".

Ben

Thanks so much for your well intentioned reply. The article you referenced -- and accompanying physician's website -- illustrate some of the difficulties in researching this subject and getting a clear picture of the choices available and true, current state of the art. I've found that web content on this subject falls into three pretty clear categories:

1. Out-and-out fraud and quackery. It's been around since the beginning of time, and the Internet has just made it that much easier for all of the crooks and petty thieves out there to make a quick buck off of people's fears and misinformation. The sites that extol "oral chelation" for cleaning out atherosclerotic plaque are a prime example of this kind of BS.

2. Research articles published in refereed journals. At the other end of the spectrum entirely, they offer no quick fixes, only scholarly research that requires careful interpretation.

3. Sites created by legitimate medical practitioners which steathfully advance their own private for-profit agendas. These are probably the most misleading and insidious, because unlike (1) they hide their quackery under a thin veneer of legitimacy. Worse, they justify their positions by using carefully constructed argumentative techniques, picking and choosing reference articles which back their positions while ignoring those which contradict it. Read a little bit deeper and you see that Dr. McDougall is pushing his $4,000, ten-day residential "program." Hardly an unbiased source of data.

Every single mention of extreme lifestyle and dietary modifications, as a method for treating, slowing, or reversing coronary artery disease, ultimately funnels back to a single study performed in the 90's by Dean Ornish. His results were extremely encouraging and have been reported over and over again ad nauseum. Unfortunately, his study used a statistically insignificant sample and did not account for a whole host of confounding factors. Most damning, however, is that dozens of attempts to repeat or validate his findings have been completely unsuccessful. Ornish's studies are generally considered as bad research and pseudo-science by the cardiology community.

My personal cardiologist doesn't make money by prescribing drugs or referring me to surgical interventions; if there were some simple magic bullet lifestyle change he could recommend, that he hasn't already, he'd do it in a heartbeat (so to speak).

Hi Bob,

You have spent more time looking into than I so at best all I can do is ask questions.

I was suprised to hear from more than one of those "oldest people in world" that mentioned alcohol in moderation. What have you read on that topic and how do you feel about that idea?

Ben

Y'all will have to live without both my pearls of wisdom and my smart-asre-ery for a few days - my missus gave birth to our son, Elliott Darcy Relf last night. Mum and bub are doing well, Dad needs sleep.

Congratulations! Once you get used to lack of sleep, nothing tops it ... except listining to him tell you are a grandparent.

Ben

Something started to go wring with my LabVIEW 2009f2 install. I'm working and all of the sudden a dialog box pops up saying "Failed to create directory for auto recovery VIs". Not much info on how to troubleshoot that, and searching (both the internet and my filesystem) isn't bringing up anything. Anyone know where the files are supposed to be created? The LabVIEW install has been working fine since the 2009 release until today...

I get those message on-site where the IT dept decided the users should not have write access to their desktop.

I belive the are saved at

My documents \LabVIEW Data\LVAutoSave

Ben

Well, all you US folk seem to forget that it is also St Maarten.

I'm going to wire up a latern and get myself some candy.

To forget we must first know. So I'll stash that post away for next year.

Ben

So you mean US only or all WW1 veterans? This wikipedia article suggests otherwise.

Well now i am not sure. She listens to BBC World America in the morning and yells highlight at me while I am busy with other stuff. I reacall seeing the ceremonies in GB last years where I think there were three remaining from GB at that time.

Ben

November 11th is not only US Veterans Day, but also the anniversary of Armistice Day, so I extend the good thoughts further than just the USA forces.

Chris

(RAAF 1SQN 21FLT)

Right you are!

Acording to the tidbit my wife heard this AM, this is the first Armistice Day where we have no veterans of the first war still amoung us.

Ben

Hi friends ,

I am back again..

I am getting the following error when I am trying to change the label of a numeric indicator placed inside a cluster.

Error 1057 occurred at Open VI Object Reference in 01Case_Cluster.vi

Possible reason(s):

LabVIEW: Type mismatch: Object cannot be type casted to the specified type.

I dont why.. I have been trying to fix this problem for an hour but couldn't.

I have attached the VI along with this post for your reference... please help..

Thanks for your time..!!!

Sharon

01Case.vi

Diva.vi

Unless the cluster in question is NOT part of a running VI, you can not change the lable but you can change the caption. If you are having trouble type casting your reference you may want to look at the Nugget I wrote (on the Dark-Side) that can be found here.

http://forums.ni.com/ni/board/message?board.id=170&view=by_date_ascending&message.id=267659#M267659

It demonstrates one method of dealing with complex data structures.

Just trying to help,

Ben

Happy Veterans Day. Thanks for your service.

Note: Direct link is only good for today.

Thank you Paul!

Ben

(FTM2 US Navy 1979)

I can work with that...

Public Sevice Announcement/Warning!

Before agrreing to implement an application that use a bright color scheme* as shown above, think twice! After a day of staring at a screen with that color mix you will suffer from image persistance. I threatened to charge hazardous duty rates the next time they come back.

Ben

* I developed an application for a company that did all of their markting research up-front right down to the RGB values of all colors used in the GUI. It turns out that most of the decision makers in their product area were women and a color scheme of Pink and Purple where chosen by them. They have been selling the product for the last 8 years so it may have worked but ... I still think that some of my cone receptors may have been damage along the way.

BTW: The tab control can be customized to look like a cloud and using image only format of the tabs will let you click on a lobe of the cloud to change pages.

... 95% of what I write I write alone, so I've got to be internally motivated to deal with this.

Give it a try Cat!

The first time you open a VI that you have not touched in a long time and the diagram drags the needle of your brain back to the same track it was on at development time, you'll be hooked.

Short G_Story:

A customer called me two years after I delivered an app and asked "Ben!, the app hung right after X, did the data get saved". Biring up the diagram, SD to the right state, I reply "Yes it was saved". Without the visual aids, I would have to start humming and scratching.

Ben

I should have said I've never seen a LV application that started with a state diagram. It doesn't surprise me that VIE and Ben use them; being professional development houses carries with it a different set of expectations than being an internal tool developer. Down here in the mud I just haven't seen them. I actually did try to put one together for an app I built and it turned out to be surprisingly difficult. I haven't found much information on how to best go about creating state diagrams. The examples I've seen online tend to be fairly trivial.

...

This reply will not be of much educational use but I have to reply/confess.

I was introduced to State Diagrams when I was in the Navy and was being trained in the NATO Sea Sparrow Missle system 33 years ago (peanut tubes were being phased out, see link below).

http://www.fas.org/m...ssile/rim-7.htm

Since I was young and impresionable, I adopted that way of think without question. At that time I was only being trained to read them and not on the theory that goes into devloping them. So SD's just seem to flow such that I find it difficlut to even describe the thought process involved. So this again explains why I miss the SDE since it allowed my to express my designs in the same form as they appear in my head.

What can I offer to help use SD?

1) If your diagram is too confusing to present to the person managing the $$$, it should be simplified.

2) Any time you spot a set of state-trasnisitions that fan-out and them merge again, you have a sub-VI that warrents it own SD.

Just sharing thoughts. Please excuse the noise.

Ben

Many moons ago I wrote some code where (I thought) this sort of construct did not reliably work. I had to separate one property node into multiple nodes and access them sequentially to get them to always execute in the right order.

Was I imagining things? Does LV automatically execute property nodes in the same top-to-bottom order all the time? If so, it would definitely save me some screen space.

Cat

There is another benefit (when LV is working correctly) !

THe property nodes have to execute in the UI thread, so there is a thread swap for every property node. When we pile up all of the properties in one node, LV can switch threads, do all of the settings and then switch back. I believe it was LV 8.6 or 8.6 were i read a post by Rolf indicating thise not working correctly and there was a thread swap for each property (oh bother!).

Ben

I like the balloon idea. Simple, inexpensive, and everyone gets to participate. (Might want to blow up the balloons before-hand though.) Given their age and your time limit I wouldn't try to teach them anything... instead just show them something cool they will remember.

Swing a bucket of water without spilling it?

Ben

There is IQ and EQ difference. Maybe engineers and scientists have high IQ, but not necessary high on EQ. Part of IQ are born with, but EQ is trained in life. Enginners/Scientists don't have time to train their EQ which is necessary for politics and people skills, they are just happy to play around with their high IQ, maybe? :-)

What is EQ ?

To all,

Lots of good ideas there. I'll resist adding my thought to avoid fouling the water.

Re: Musician and comeidans I'm n the same page as Socrates as described by Plato in The Republic.

Ben

I've been thinking about doing this. Where do you paste the images? Off to the side somewhere? I'm thinking about wrapping a stacked sequence structure (gasp!) around the SM and putting the SD in frame0. Mostly because I really really don't like a BD being more than one (1024x768) screen.

Have you been reading my posts on the Dark-Side?

This thread (on the Dark-Side)

http://forums.ni.com/ni/board/message?board.id=170&view=by_date_ascending&message.id=230782#M230782

shows different ways that I have documented SDs and if you read that thread that you will read that I used to work with a developer that taught me the only legitimate use of a multi-frame stacked seq structure was to include the documentation. We used to call her the "Architect Supreme" becuase she was the first person in the world to be qualified at the architect level for both LV and TestStand.

I perfer to put the code in frame "0" and the documentation if later frames to speed up execution highlighting.

Ben

....

...

...

...

Indeed.

It was a rather a feeble example, since each state would only have 1 vi in it (but thats because of the hierarchal design). But it was more to demonstrate readablility.

I did try (miserably by the sounds of it) to make that clear by saying "The readablilty issue is clear" . But the point was that a state machines readability suffers from the same issues as stacked sequences.

...

This is one of the reason I lamented the passing of the State Diagram Editor. I just had to right-click to bring up the SDE screen to see it in SDE form, I could watch the states transition in execution highlighting mode, and could click on the state in the SDE and the associated case was selected.

Lacking the SDE, I just paste my SD images into the BD for ready reference.

Ben

Don't think we have too many of them here in Northern Virginia. We have politicians instead.

Careful about the static demo. If the humidity is too high they will not work.

Ben

My daughter's kindergarten class has parents come in and talk about their jobs. Since data analysis seems like it would be hard to explain to kindergartners, I thought I'd talk about some of the things that physicists study. I also want stuff that doesn't require that I go out and spend a fortune on props.

I had a few ideas:

• Simultaneously drop a softball and ping-pong ball (or maybe a crumpled-up paper) and show that they fall at the same rate (Galileo's thing).
• Have kids rub balloons on their hair and show how they stick to things.
• Maybe this: http://www.kidsmakes...icles/show/fedm

I may only have about 5-10 minutes.

Any other suggestions?

Gary

Conservation of angular momentum?

It only takes a swivel chair and someone willing to sit and extend/withdraw arms to slow/speed up.

Magnet are almost magical by themselves. If there is still a CRT around you can mess up the screen with a magnet 9or ruin it if the magnet is too string).

I'll keep thinking for you.

Ben