Jump to content

xtal

Members
  • Posts

    131
  • Joined

  • Last visited

Posts posted by xtal

  1. The situation you described really sucks, Crystal, but let's not vilify a feature that isn't being forced on the user in any way by LabVIEW itself, but instead was improperly used in a special circumstance.

    I vilify Clean Up Diagram because it deserves it. How do you "improperly use" a button? There was nothing even remotely "clean" in what it produced; I can't imagine ANY LV programmer wanting their code to look like that. If someone hit Delete, then the *situation* would suck because that's what Delete is supposed to do and you might have clicked it when you didn't mean to. As it stands, I think the Cleanup feature sucks because it doesn't do what it is supposed to.

  2. A flash drive backup would seem to be an alternative as well in that case.

    We did after it was all "fixed" but we were heavily in trouble-shooting mode at the time and all available USB drives were occupied with ESTOP, joysticks, and such. We had no idea the kid was gonna modify our code like that. I wasn't even there since there wasn't room in the pit and I needed to talk to the NI folks about some cRIO things. It would be so much easier if I could just disable that button like I can the Abort and Continuous Run ones. Why is that so unreasonable?

  3. I'm sorry for the awful situation, but I don't know that disabling a toolbar button is the real answer.

    We can disable/hide the Abort button and turn off debugging. I don't see why it's an unreasonable request.

    For those who are suggesting SCC, you are completely missing the point. The drive computer is a bare-bones system that communicates with the robot during a competition. It's not the development machine/environment. We only change the code between matches based on how the robot performs. We use SolidWorks to model and design the robot, too, but we certainly can't put it on the drive computer, either.

  4. I've looked around but it appears I can't turn off/hide/diasable the Clean Up Diagram button in my LabVIEW environment.

    Why I want to do this is a huge rant, so ignore the rest of this post if you don't want to hear anything negative on a lovely Friday.

    As many of you know, I am the mentor of a FIRST Robotics team and we went to the World Championship last week. The programmer for our team, Tomas, learned all his LabVIEW from me, so he codes exactly like I do. I'm an old-school LabVIEW developer from long before there was an Undo and I've developed many habits and a particular style over the years. I don't think any of my style points are terribly wrong or bad; heck, I even helped develop and maintain the LabVIEW Style Guide used internally when I was on the LV development team. I like to have minimal wire bends, I like similar items aligned and distributed, I line items up by either the Error terminals or by like refnums. Structures are similar sizes and at most my diagrams need only be scrolled in one direction. I don't hide wires or nodes behind each other or shrink structures to hide things nor do I make structures larger than they need to be.

    At the competition, we had some technical difficulties and in the spirit of coopertition, the programmers from other teams came by to help. It was all well and good until one kid hit the Clean Up Diagram and immediately saved the code. I've never see such a mess of technicolor spaghetti in my life! Tomas can no longer read his own code, so he can't make the changes to the program for our last matchs. I can't read his code, we are both frustrated ... and then it gets WORSE! We found a quiet place and try to fix the mess. Except that after every 3-4 edits like wire moves, structure resizes, etc, LabVIEW crashes with drawmgr.c messages. It was the most horrible LabVIEW experience I've ever had. I NEVER say anything bad about LabVIEW; I've even defended the poor misunderstood Express VIs...I'm still trying to make Shared Variables work...I will only program in LabVIEW. But I have nothing good to say about this "Clean Up Diagram" feature. I will never use it and I don't want it available on any LV development system I have to touch. I want to punch someone in the face for making a feature that makes kids cry and vow never to use LabVIEW again. {Okay, Tomas didn't actually cry, but I've never seen him so upset and he doesn't want to use LabVIEW ever again.} I now understand why that "I Hate LabVIEW" site exists. I'm almost ready to join it.

    This has been bugging me for a week now and I'm glad I finally got to vent. For those who read this far, thanks for listening.

  5. Hey, Paul

    I've been working with high school students and while they are complete novices at programming, they take to LabVIEW very easily. We don't do OOP but we have been programming cRIOs to make robots. Let me know if you want me to invite you (and others at Lowell) to any of their events. Keep an eye out for the CocoNuts (Coconino High School's Robotics group) and FIRST. I've been mentoring them for 2 years now and absolutely love it!

  6. Define "major release"... VS put out versions 2003, 2005, 2008, and 2010. Are these major upgrades?

    When you work in a regulated environment, updating SW from 8.6 to 8.6.1 is considered a pretty major change requiring all sorts of revalidation. I'm fine with LV updating often and fixing things on a yearly cycle, but don't expect me to jump on board for each new rev the second it releases. Most of my projects are still in 8.2.1 and 8.6.1. Yes, I'm falling way behind on the "new features" curve, but it sure beats having to revalidate dozens of machines.

  7. OK but will they wear the NewBalance (because they're Sheilas) or the Redback because they've come there to 'kick arse'

    Neither, I'll wear Teva sandals like always (no socks) because I'm the weird hippy chick from Flagstaff. wink.gif

  8. In case you haven't heard, LV 2011 is going to be largely a stability release. The entire LV team, acting on requests from customers, is going to pull back on features, focusing on bugs, performance and integration between existing features. There will be very little that is new in LV 2011, but we think customers will want it nonetheless.

    Yes! This is pretty much the only thing you could have said that will make me upgrade from 8.6 -- and have me urging the other 10 LV users in my plant to do the same. Thanks for the great news!

  9. Just when I think I want to become a certified LV Developer or Architect, I read messages like this. My employer trusts my abilities and doesn't require certification, so I'd only do it for my own gratification (and to join the cool people at NIWeek). Also, now that I work for a medical device company, we don't have the luxury of using the latest SW releases. I just upgraded some machines to 8.6.1. So I'm sure I'd fail the exams because I don't know about, much less use, any of the newer features.

    Good luck, Dave. But if you don't pass, I won't hold it against you.

  10. I always stay at the Radisson. That's the one with the nicest pool - a MUST if you aren't used to the oppressive heat of Austin. Plus, between the Starbucks and TGIFridays, all your tasty beverage choices are covered. TGIFs even provides pool service food and drinks.

  11. I needed something similar and ended up using the Variable-Time Chart XY example that ships with LV. I made a few modifications to make it do exactly what I wanted, but this should give you a good start.

    Let me know if anything more elegant or flexible comes along.

  12. I'll be there - I can't ruin my 100% NIWeek attendance streak!

    I'll be at the Radisson (just to be different) from Sat - Fri.

    I'll be at the Gingerman on Sun night and the LAVA BBQ on Tues and all the official NIWeek events.

    See y'all soon!

  13. Damn, how hot is "hot" if you can't walk a few blocks to get there?

    Do people melt that time of year if they stay outside too long or what? ohmy.gif

    I've been to NIWeeks where it was 110 deg F every day (43 deg C) with a fair amount of humidity. Since I come from a cool climate where we don't even have air conditioning (and don't need it), I find this level of heat and humidity VERY stiffling. I used to do Preventative Search and Rescue at the Grand Canyon, but I'll spare you the lectures on heat stroke and such..."melting" pretty much sums it up.

×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

By using this site, you agree to our Terms of Use.