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How can one get LabVIEW on a MacBook Pro?


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I just started using LabVIEW three months ago for my class so I know there may be problems with the Mac version of LabVIEW so I would prefer to download the Windows version. What would be the best way to get it on my MacBook Pro?

 

Thanks a lot!

 

I use LabVIEW for Mac on an iMac regularly. What do you expect to not work?

 

You don't have many hardware IO interfaces on the Mac but running LabVIEW for Windows in a virtual machine won't give you more options for sure. And BootCamp or whatever that is called nowdays likely will be also not a full solution since Windows doesn't come with drivers for every hardware component in a MacBook Pro.

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I use LabVIEW for Mac on an iMac regularly. What do you expect to not work?

 

You don't have many hardware IO interfaces on the Mac but running LabVIEW for Windows in a virtual machine won't give you more options for sure. And BootCamp or whatever that is called nowdays likely will be also not a full solution since Windows doesn't come with drivers for every hardware component in a MacBook Pro.

 

I do all my development on a MacBook Pro in Bootcamp and VirtualBox, and I have yet to find something that doesn't work in LabVIEW for Windows.

 

The only thing I've found that doesn't work all the time, is that USB access in virtual machines can be a bit shaky. But, this seems to be more related to VirtualBox than the MacBook.

 

/J

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I am forgoing the option to dual boot Windows on my Mac so performance is not affected. Rather, I am looking for a reliable virtual machine that LabVIEW performs the best on. 

 

On my MacBook Pro, I use a number of Virtal Machines running with VirtualBox regardless if I boot MacOSX or Windows.

The only issue so far has been that one USB device driver failed to load in the Virtual machine.

 

/J

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I am setting up the virtual machine right now and I am new to it. VirtualBox gave me several 'hard disk file type' options (virtual box disk image, virtual machine disk, virtual hard disk, parallels hard disk, QEMU enhanced disk, or QCOW - QEMU Copy-on-Write). Then I had the option to choose a dynamically allocated hard disk file (will only use space on my physical hard disk file as it fills up, up to a maximum fixed size, and it will not shrink automatically when space on it is freed) or a fixed size hard disk file (which may take longer to create on some systems but is faster to use).

 

I am only using the virtual machine for the purpose of using LabVIEW on Windows and not much more than that. Which of the above options should I choose? In addition, how much memory (RAM) should I allocate to the virtual machine?

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This is why I do my development with the native Mac LabVIEW rather than run in any sort of virtual machine. If for some reason I really want Windows LabVIEW -- generally because I'm drawing a UI with system controls and I want to see how it looks on Windows -- I remote desktop into my work machine. But when I'm developing on my laptop, I just use the Mac version. Avoids all of these weirdnesses. 

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This is why I do my development with the native Mac LabVIEW rather than run in any sort of virtual machine. If for some reason I really want Windows LabVIEW -- generally because I'm drawing a UI with system controls and I want to see how it looks on Windows -- I remote desktop into my work machine. But when I'm developing on my laptop, I just use the Mac version. Avoids all of these weirdnesses. 

Where did you download the mac version? i can't seem to find the actual download page on the NI site.

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Where did you download the mac version? i can't seem to find the actual download page on the NI site.

My download location won't help you -- I copy mine off of the build machine. :-)

 

To the best of my knowledge, the Mac version isn't available for public download. You purchase it by contacting NI and they tell you how to get it. Details here: https://www.ni.com/mac/

Mac version doesn't have all the same license controls on it to limit piracy, so it isn't just downloadable the way the Windows version is.

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You purchase it by contacting NI and they tell you how to get it.

 

True. Unless something has changed for LV2015, you can request a copy from your sales contact, and they will ship you a DVD. (Yes. A DVD. For a Mac.) Word on the street, this might be changing to USB drive soon? (Which is also kinda jokey, unless there's a USB-C option as well!!)

 

 

Mac version doesn't have all the same license controls on it to limit piracy, so it isn't just downloadable the way the Windows version is.

 

The licensing technology is basically a pinky swear. One thing that's totally awesome is how fast it installs.

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i tried both command keys on the mac...to no avail

Maybe I'm stating the obvious, but if you develop on LabVIEW for Mac, you use the command-key + the short cut, but when you switch to the virtual machine you will have to use the ctrl+shortcut instead.

In the link Hooovahh gave you (https://lavag.org/to...ing-in-labview/) you can find a solution for ctrl-key shortcuts not working in the Virtual machine.

 

/J

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