Phillip Brooks

There's no school like the OLD school! I've been exploring social networks a bit more and I added a review of "A Software Engineering Approach to LabVIEW" to my LinkedIn profile. I commented that some of the techniques shown are a bit dated, but have the advantage of working in any version of LabVIEW at the base version. A day or two later, I read on the NI community about a call for new/better templates and everyone is talking about events and classes and patterns (bla bla bla); but the currently shipping basic templates could certainly use a face lift. New users that might be best influenced by well defined patterns may currently only have a Base license and therefore could not learn the fundamentals of typecasting, string/enum conversion or Boolean logic. Maybe we need some Old School 2.0 templates? Classic Templates Redux?

That's one BIG block diagram!

Thank God that Wikipedia is back on line; I couldn't prove to my brother that Scientology was a controversial subject!

Feb 17, 2010: Google gives $2M US to Wikipedia. March 22, 2010: Wikipedia founder praises Google over China Decision March 23, 2010; 2:00 PM Wikipedia DOWN What do you think? EDIT: OK, after I spend all this time concocting a great plot, it appears it was some overheated servers in Europe that forced traffic to be redirected to Florida, and the DNS redirects are broken. They claim it will be an hour or two for the addressing to resolve itself..

Cat with Mac & Cheese You really CAN find anything using Google (except in China).

I moved this post, then read this post. I wonder: Where is the LAVA site hosted? Maybe LAVA could offer LabVIEW hosting as a way to generate revenue to pay for things like embedded google search. Just a thought...

Fuzzy Logic Toolkit should help... ($1,049 US)

or the 5th Dimension...

I've been playing around with my own MCL functions and I've been using Get Text Rect.vi as you suggested; but I also go the extra step to retrieve the CellFont properties of each cell as an input into the Get Text Rect.vi. (just in case someone uses fonts or sizes other than App or System types) I've had as many as 500 rows with no significant delays... MCL Get Max Col Widths.vi (LV 8.6)

Here is a LabVIEW 7.0 VI that you can use to programmatically determine the VI execution state settings for a specific VI. VI Exec Options.vi (LV 7.0)

I do NOT use SCC at this time, but I've just gone through a somewhat painful experience because of inplaceness. I believe that inplacess may be part of this SCC problem. Specifically, I have an llb containing several dialogs that were originally written in LV 5.0 that have only been recompiled up to 7.0 and then 8.6. The dialog vis are used to load and display BMP and JPG files, and implement error in/error out terminals. There were no BMP functions in LV 5.0, so the group used some info-LabVIEW based BMP functions. The BMP functions output to an intensity graph, and the JPG functions to a picture. The dialog VIs would hide and show either the picture or intensity graph based on the extension of the image, but there was no data flow between the property nodes causing a race condition, the image control would randomly be visible or hidden. I proceeded to refactor the VIs. I changed them from polling of buttons to an event structure, replaced the info-LabVIEW library with the NI supplied BMP functions and was able to eliminate the intensity graph. I was also able to add support for PNG while I was at it. The problem was the error clusters. Before refactoring, the dialog VIs passed through the error cluster (through various cases in a state machine using shift registers); BUT the error cluster never passed through any functions, property nodes or sub-vis. After refactoring, I had bunches of calling code to these VIs that required a recompile. OK, I figured it had something to do with changing the front panel (removed an indicator). I refactored again, and left the intensity graph hidden, off the front panel visible area. SAME PROBLEM, recompiles required. WTF?! I determined the problem was that I had wired the error cluster through nodes that could modify the contents of the error cluster. I had not added, removed or changed any controls or indicators on the FP. I had not modified the connector pane. It was the error cluster. See the attached example. Open the top level VI. No recompile required. Open the sub-vi and in case 1 modify the error cluster wire to pass from the file close to the shift register. Save. Exit LV. Open the top level VI and it will show an asterisk. Open the sub-vi and restore the error cluster wire in case 1 as it was. Save the sub-vi and exit LabVIEW. Open the top level vi and recompile is not required, even though the sub vi has been modified multiple times. This brings out an important point. If you use template VIs that include error in/ error out handling where there is CURRENTLY no change to error in/ error out, you better modify your template to create artificial data changes or the inplaceness algorithm will bite your @ss. Without an artifical data change, one bit of functionality that you wire up to the error cluster will cause the callers to to need to be recompiled. This appears to become more of a problem with SCC. There was a discussion about error handling style a year or two ago. I remember stating that if A VI contains no nodes that modify the error cluster, then I don't personally add an error in / error out to the connector pane. I guess I was smarter than I thought! Quote of the day: Inplaceness is synonymous with insidiousness ... EDIT: Artificial data change is my own term (unbundle and bundle). When I re-read my post, I can't help but think that the compiler is getting better and smarter, and we're getting sneakier and sneakier. How long will it be before the compiler can figure out an artificial data change? Recompile Problem.llb

Don't forget that there is already a method to add comments to a VI that include a timestamp; its called 'Revision History'. Simply press 'Ctrl-y'. There is a whole category in the LabVIEW options to customize the behavior of this feature. I seem to recall that there was a question on the NI forums at one point about doing away with this function, but I don't recall ever hearing that Rev History would be indeed removed. Found it: http://forums.ni.com/ni/board/message?board.id=features&thread.id=112

I just downloaded it now; I'll post it here for you: Xmodem VISA.llb

Clean up Block diagram! It took a while, but we have it.

Could you use the XMODEM protocol? There is some OpenG code that supports XMODEM. http://forums.openg.org/index.php?showtopic=258&hl=xmodem

But then the dreams will end. Imagine plugging your USB connector into your CRIO. The possibilities! http://www.gocomics.com/foxtrot/2010/02/21/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=gadget&utm_campaign=gadget_clickthrough

Phillip Brooks (NI) == Phillip Brooks (LAVA) (Used to be LV_Punk on LAVA. A play on the wrestler CM Punk; real name Phil Brooks) And yes, I'm still global free, sequence structure free and BETTER THAN YOU!

You're much more than a "Lounge lizard". Thanks for the contributions!

Who do I friend on Facebook in order to learn how to properly make a LAVA post that will result in a tweet? I want to make #popcorn for Justin!

The popper is on Engadget! Don't forget to use synchtube if you want to view the youtube video real time with your friends (my nephew will appreciate it)...

Jean-Luc also preferred real books... Picard's Syndrome

Exactly my thinking! Imagine tomorrow's JD Salinger (R.I.P.) being published only in electronic format. Years after the technology is disabled (EMP renders electronics useless/blank; big brother activates the 'revoke' function on your e-reader because the book questions current political thinking) and the story/concept/history is lost. Talk about irony; Amazon deleted Orwell's "Animal Farm" and "1984" from Kindles after they were paid for by trusting customers. Amazon Erases Orwell Books from Kindle As I said, this is more about technology seeking money rather than improving the quality of our life. Rant over. If you want to discuss it further, write me a letter. I'm calling my mom now to make sure that our "Man walks on moon" issue of the Jamestown Post-Journal is still safely stored away...

Technical: I didn't spend a lot of time with them, but I looked at the Sony and nook readers just before Christmas. The nook seemed like the nicer unit to me, but I didn't get to hold it; there was a big crowd gathered around a sales person demonstrating the features. The sample Sony unit bolted to the kiosk was awful! The screen flickered when changing pages and the response time to menu selections was very slow. Social: To me, these devices are a solution looking for a problem. The only 'problem' they seem to solve is that of the distribution of wealth. According to reports, the publishers give up 30% of the price, but have no printing, inventory or distribution overhead; just marketing and editing prior to release. The publishers will make more because they certainly paid more than 30% in production costs. Lets say for the sake of argument that it is 50% (probably low). The 50% that used to be distributed amongst loggers, paper mills, printers, trucking companies and book stores provided income that was in turn used to pay mortgages; to buy cars, groceries and books . A free economy is like a well architected LabVIEW application; it depends upon flow. The 30% redirected to the new business model seemingly goes to support the infrastructure to distribute the books. This is false because as a user you must pay subscription fees for access (cellular, broadband, etc...). The human part of this support is not being done by the displaced business model; it is being performed by 'the lowest bidder'. The 20% savings by the publishing house is still highly contested between the publishers and the authors and will likely be split between them in the end.

What does this say about Alfa? (or more importantly, me since I'm discussing people)

I'm depressed. I want to visit Pandora, but the prostitutes won't tell me how to get their because I might try to steal some of the Unobtainium...