I am switching to a new job (though still with NI)

[Aristos Queue]

Well, folks, after 11.5 years of essentially the same job, I'm going to do something new starting next week. This transition is going to change some of my online interaction with the LV user community.

For many years, I have directly shaped labview.exe and the VI libraries that ship with LabVIEW. Now, I will switch from "working on LabVIEW" to "working with LabVIEW" -- but I still won't be a G programmer. You see, the text code of LabVIEW has many parts: an editor, a type system, a compiler, etc. Over the last three years, R&D has reworked each of these components to become an isolated API that could -- in theory -- be reused to build a completely different editor, a different type system, a different compiler. In my new role, I'm going to be attempting to do just that, but not to develop any new products. Instead, I'm going to be building small applications that prove out the usability and documentation of these various layers -- apps that are more about being a good tutorial for the API than for doing anything particularly useful themselves. The goal of this work is to prep these layers to be opened up for more people to use. In the short run, that means helping LV R&D team members around the world get the documentation and API support they need when they can't just walk to someone's desk in Austin, TX, to ask questions. In the long run (3 to 5 years), we hope that we'll be able to open these APIs up to the full LabVIEW community to use. That means not just augmenting LabVIEW but also writing whole new applications in the LabVIEW product environment.

I am handing off all of my duties for maintenance of features I have built over the years, and LV 2012 is the last LV version for the next few years that will have my fingerprints on the EXE. Oh, I'll probably fix a CAR or two, but I won't be working on the code on a daily basis. I do plan to keep working on G in my spare time, and it may be that I'll have a few small contributions to LabVIEW G tools and vi.lib, but certainly not to the level I've been working at lately.

I will still be monitoring LAVA, but for the next few years, I am going to be much more of a "LabVIEW user" than a "LabVIEW developer". That means I will be saying less of "oh, let me go fix that real fast" and saying more of "yeah, I wish they'd fix that, too". In the short run, that means my direct impact on improving LabVIEW is going to decrease. But I think that this new position will be beneficial to LabVIEW in the long run if I really can get the entire platform to be a more open system. And, who knows, some of those mini apps may actually have some functionality that proves useful... I've got a couple ideas in my head already. If all goes as planned, a few years down the road, the APIs that empower creating custom nodes, specifying alternate models of computation, and compiling to truly foreign targets will be wide open. Then I could move happily back to the Language team armed with a lot more power and with a whole community of developers able to help build the future.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go get some sleep... I've got two days left and a sizable list of CARs that Certain People have asked me to fix before I switch roles. :-)

[mike5]

So, I guess the question is "Have you trained a successor for your current role, and when do we get to meet him?"

But seriously, thank you for your help and involment with user community. I didn't deal with you directly much, but whenever I saw your post I thought "now we'll get some real answers". To have someone like that from NI is great for us developers and users.

That is also the reason for my openig joke. We came to rely on you for the really difficult stuff so much, that hearing you saying "I won't be able to help you to the extent that I used to" makes me nervous. I just hope your superiors are aware of this, and have someone ready to step in your current shoes.

Good luck with your next assignment. I'm sure you'll be excellent at it, as you are now.

Br, Mike

[dannyt]

I would just like to wish you both good luck and good fun in your new role, I have enjoyed reading your LAVA contrbutions and learnt from them. Sound like you will be having an interesting time of it the next few years.

regards

Danny

[Val Brown]

Well damn, I hope this isn't the Peter principle writ large....

Seriously AQ, I guess that congratulations are in order but I didn't actually hear you say that you're really looking forward to this change, or that you even especially wanted it so I guess the jury is out on some of that but still and FWIW -- congratulations! :beer_mug:

Now for the really serious aspect of this. Who will be "filling your shoes"? The obvious answer is: No one, because no one can no matter how good they are. So let me rephrase that: who in your opinion is the "goto guy" now (bearing in mind that guy is a metro term so not gender specific)? Who can LAVA and the rest of the LV world count on for the "real story" and for a strong and clear advocate for users, esp knowledgeable and experienced users? It's a real question and I shudder to think what it means if there isn't a really clear, good answer.

In any event I know that you'll bring your enormous talents and dedication to your new responsibilities and we'll all benefit from that -- as we always have. And many, many, many thanks for all the wonderful contributions you made to this forum and, of course, to LB itself over the years.

[jgcode]

Great news - congrats on the new role AQ.

Who can LAVA and the rest of the LV world count on for the "real story" and for a strong and clear advocate for users, esp knowledgeable and experienced users?

I say we lean on Mike?

[mje]

Congratulations! I hope you enjoy your new job.

Also hope to still see you around, I have learned a lot from your contributions to LAVA over the years.

[Yair]

In the long run (3 to 5 years), we hope that we'll be able to open these APIs up to the full LabVIEW community to use...

See? you're already becoming a user. In the past you would have use "the long run" for 10 years, so that's already an improvement.

But seriously, I'm sure LV R&D has enough smart people in it and it matters less exactly where you are as long you do something productive and keep being involved with the community (and ideally if you can get others to be involved as well).

Personally, I really welcome this change to LV that you're describing and I think that it's excellent that NI is putting efforts into making this transition organized and structured. I'm hoping that because of this change, LV 2017 will see considerably more improvements compared to 2011 than 2011 has compared to 8.2. The only criticism I have is "why so long?" (I am a customer, after all).

[Francois Normandin]

Congratulations Stephen and many thanks for your involvement in bringing OOP to LabVIEW.

I can say that it changed a lot of things in my programming, all of them for the better. It's given me the opportunity to tackle problems in a whole new light and I feel I've improved both my pleasure and productivity while tackling them.

I hope I can say the same again in 3-5 years.

[Aristos Queue]

Seriously AQ, I guess that congratulations are in order but I didn't actually hear you say that you're really looking forward to this change, or that you even especially wanted it so I guess the jury is out on some of that but still and FWIW -- congratulations! :beer_mug:

I am excited -- it's a cautious excitement as this takes me well outside my comfort zone, but excitement nonetheless.

Who will be "filling your shoes"?

I've been encouraging some of the others to participate more and more on the forums. In particular, Mr. Mike has taken up some of that challenge. And I'm not vanishing entirely, just changing tune.

[Antoine Chalons]

I imagine that, in a way, the evolution you're talking about is related to that comment of yours : "In 2002, when users were just seeing LV 6.1, I was looking forward to what would eventually be LV 8.2. Today, I am officially looking forward to LV 2016. Or 2017. Not sure."

As Daklu said, this is brutal teasing!

Good luck with your new role!

[Omar Mussa]

Congratulations and good luck with your new role! You've made really great contributions to both LabVIEW and the LabVIEW Community that will have a long lasting impact.

[crelf]

I am excited -- it's a cautious excitement as this takes me well outside my comfort zone, but excitement nonetheless.

IMHO that's the best kind of excitement - congrats on the new tack.

[Fab]

I am excited -- it's a cautious excitement as this takes me well outside my comfort zone, but excitement nonetheless.

I read recently that "life starts where your comfort zone ends". I wish you the best and that you enjoy this new role as much or even more than your current one. You have always been an inspiration and we have all learned from you, partly because you love what you do, you are good at it and you enjoy it.

[MikaelH]

All the best wishes on your new role.

[todd]

Finally! AQ is going to provide text-based LabVIEW!

[Aristos Queue]

Finally! AQ is going to provide text-based LabVIEW!

Actually, I've warned my new manager that at some point I may have a nervous breakdown and wrap all those function calls in VIs directly and thereafter deny the existence of the under-the-hood code. It just feels so wrong not having pictures to tell me what's going on in the code...