Is it time to deploy LabVIEW 8.0 yet?

[crelf]

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NOTE: This is a cross post from Info-LabVIEW

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G'Day Everyone,

I work for a fairly large System Integrator, and we're considering the migration from LabVIEW 7.1 to 8.0. Recalling the considerable hardship the 5.1.1 to 6.0 route caused to just about everyone, I'm being a little cautious. I'm not one of those that swears not to migrate until software is in the x.1 phase, but I also recognize that significant changes were made between 7.1 and 8.0 (I was a member of the beta programme and liked what I saw, but the beta software wasn't anywhere near finished so I couldn't test a lot of what I wanted to - it just wasn't ready. I have used the 8.0 release dev environment as well, but not extensive enough to consider it on a full-blown project as yet).

I've used a number of methods in the past to evaluate the time to move from one version of LabVIEW to another, and probably the most reliable that I've found is Info-LabVIEW itself: perhaps the number of issues reported here are directly proportional to the number of issues I'll have with it? I've also noticed that the number of posts generally increases after a new version is released. But it doesn't seem so this time - whilst there have been a handful of issues reported here since 8.0's release, I have seen anything that would be a show-stopper, and I was wondering if that is because everyone is more than happy with 8.0 (I certainly hope so , or people aren't happy with it and are keeping their mouths shut, or maybe you're like me and are waiting to migrate your new projects once its' been proved robust?

In short, my questions are: for those who've used 8.0 on projects - how's it going? What sort of projects are you doing? Are you finding any issues that make you wish you'd stayed with 7.1?

PLEASE NOTE: I am not interested in license issues here - if you wish you'd stayed with 7.1 because you think 8.0's license is restrictive then you've probably already been represented on this list, and I sure don't want to hash through that can-o'-worms again Just the technical aspects please.

Thanks!

Chris

[Louis Manfredi]

Hi Chris:

I made the switch to 8 a little earlier than I normally would (I happened to be at a logical break point in development of the projects I'm working on.) I didn't have any real show stopper problems, and I like many things about 8.0 a lot, but in retrospect, I sort of wish I'd waited for 8.0.1.

To summarize, I've had the following problems described in greater detail in other threads:

A problem with read text from file, works oddly if output is not wired:

http://forums.lavausergroup.org/index.php?showtopic=2245

A little peculiarity with an array of waveform controls:

http://forums.lavausergroup.org/index.php?showtopic=2325

Never did figure out out to transfer old app builder settings to new project system, and it took me a while to learn to use the project system, but all in all think the new project system is a great improvement over 7.x:

http://forums.lavausergroup.org/index.php?showtopic=2229

All in all, nothing earthshaking, but keep in mind that I'm a one man show, only about 20% of my time since upgrading is actual LabView programming, and the program I've worked on since upgrading is a pretty simple plain-vanilla collect a/d data, manipulate, display, and store routine.

Knowing what I know now, and if I had to make the decision for a large organization working on large projects, I geuss I'd wait-- Unless there was a compelling reason, such as a new large project about to begin, or a slack time in the organization meaning that it was a good time to climb the learning curve.

Hate to say it, after all at some point somebody has got to go to the new version to find the bugs, and it might just as well be a large outfit like yours that can afford the burden, rather than me, but to be honest, if I was you I'd wait a bit-- at least read all the topics under the LV8 buglist forum before you jump.

Best Regards, Louis

[Michael Aivaliotis]

Well, maybe as I get older I get less and less adventurous. I am afraid that the only reason I would switch to LV8 is if a customer specifically requests it. Even then I would ask them to give me a compelling reason. It would have to be some feature in LV8 that they can't live without, or something that can't be done in LV7.

If you are an integrator and are getting paid time and materials then you get paid either way, but if you are on fixed cost projects then it would be suicide to switch to a new LV version just because NI is preaching about it.

[i2dx]

i am member in the ssp programm and i have it and use it.

i use it for a PDA-Project, because there have been major improvements from the LV 7.1 PDA Module to the 8..0 PDA Module. e.g. the 7.1 module was not albe to detec keystrokes ...

otherwise, i still use 7.1 in other projects, first because i don't want to provoke conversion problems, second because LV8 seems a little bit embryonic to me in some parts (e.g. eht project management ...)

[Jim Kring]

Personally, I am being very selective of which projects use LabVIEW 8.0. I have been using it regularly, and the development environment crashes on me periodically when editing VIs. And I have discovered quite a few bugs -- the one that I dislike the most is that Drag and Drop doesn't work in built EXE's. If you decided to convert a project to, or start a new project in, LabVIEW 8.0, make sure that you have tested to make sure that the critical functionality is present. FPGA, RT, PDA, and other LabVIEW modules got a big boost from the LabVIEW 8.0 project, and other, features -- I have tested PDA, and it is *much* better in 8.0.

Regarding the license, it is my opinion that the LabVIEW 8.0 license is much better than the LabVIEW 6.1 or 7.x licenses.

[crelf]

...the development environment crashes on me periodically when editing VIs.

Wow! I'd call that a shopperstopped

[Jim Kring]

Wow! I'd call that a shopperstopped

I have edited my post, in order to accurately qualify my statement:

"the development environment crashes on me periodically when editing VIs."

I haven't had any problems with crashes, when simply running code -- only when editing code.

[i2dx]

I have edited my post, in order to accurately qualify my statement:

"the development environment crashes on me periodically when editing VIs."

I haven't had any problems with crashes, when simply running code -- only when editing code.

i experience this "effect", too. as i told the NI support team allready, Strg+S is more important then ever. my impression is, LV 8 is not really a stable release and there are lots of bugs.

a example:

open a blank VI, add a while loop, add a shift register to the while loop, connect a constant from outside to the left shift register, rightglick->replace with tunnels ==> a black, unused tunnel remains at the right side of the while loop. This does not happen in LV 7.1 and if you don't know it, you maybe need several minutes (and a call to the support hotline ...like me ) to find out why the F*** you have a broken arrow but NO error message at all ...

an other example:

open a blank VI, create a reference to an other VI and do not close this reference, open the vi-hierarchy window, run the vi, close the vi-hierarchy-window, close the vi, close labview ==> the hierarchy window comes up again and LabVIEW crashes

[Nico]

Sometimes, I had some crashes to.

When I updated my project, I had some stupid modifications to do. In some VIs, I had to delete few blocks and to replace them with same blocks from the LV8 palette, and after, it works.

I think the LV8 is usefull if you have project with many platforms. In my case, I have a program that run on a PXI with LV Real Time and a HMI on a PC. Before LV8, it was not able to run one labview instance for the HMI and an other one for RT. Now, you can.

[molsen]

Hi all you LV'ers.

I am shure NI has done a greate job in testing LV8 before it was released. But as we all know large software packages has bugs. The users of the software can be more or less critical about these bugs. One thing im am very shure of (also from my own experience) is that programmers are not the easiest one to release software to. They will immediately start looking for bugs and they will shurely find some in a very short while.

What is the issue here is how the manufacturer of the software handles the bugs found by the users:

- Can you report errors somewhere?

- Are the reported errors beeing handles seriously?

- Are the product beeing updated within a reasonably time?

My experience is that NI is handling all this in a very professional manner.

BUT it has also something to do with the users acting professional and reporting the bugs found to the manufacturer instead of just beeing angry about the product. Lists like info-labview, the bug list found in this site and the discussions where you all participate are very important and I hope NI is with us on this list.

Remember that NI makes a living of us using their products and we make a living of using NI products. It's a collaboration not a war!

Best regards

Henrik Molsen

microLEX Systems

[semmel]

I installed LV8 as soon as it was released, then got advised it was incompatible with Vision 7.1.1. (Apparently there's a workaround out now). So I backed out of LV8.

Vision 8 CDs turned up today, so I appreciate the "is it time" discussions.

[nudalakasim]

BUT it has also something to do with the users acting professional and reporting the bugs found to the manufacturer instead of just beeing angry about the product.

Very true...but when deadlines are near, seeing the development environment stall and crash regularly makes one go maaadddd

It seems life will just pass on in"Investigating Internal errors" and "Telling Microsoft abuot my problem".... :headbang:

"LV 8.0.1/8.1", Where are you ?

nudalAKasim

[gsussman]

I have just migrated a very large project 1000+ VIs divided over 2 platforms (Windows and RT) up to LV8 due to a showstopper problem in LV7.1

All I have to say is that I wish I had another option.

I have experienced similar development system crashes when editing, long latencies when performing operations like editing, saving, opening, etc. (feels like my cursor is perpetually in the hourglass mode as well as the telltale GUI thread starvation indicator (all windows go white while CPU time is at 100%)

Unless you had no other choice, pass on LV8 and wait for a more stable release.

[TG]

My initial experience with LV8 was very bad. It was not seamless.

I tried to install it on a machine that is not normally connected to the internet and runs a robot. That caused all kinds of problems. NI said it could be done over the phone but the activation code they gave did not work and I had different opinions from NI as to why. Then I connected the internet and tried to install again and made real mess of things. Of course some of it may havce been me but who knows.

I had to uninstall it and re-install about 4 NI packages then pray to get the original app working again.

The Rs232 mapping was totally screwed and I could not justify taking several days to look for solution.

After losing so much time and productivity talking to NI and whatever and finally said "sorry this one is not gonna fly on this app." Call me when its fixed." NI tried to help but I do not think they could duplicate my setup closely enough to give it a real try.

Im sure its better now and its too bad really, some of the new stuff would be really helpful but it is definately not for the faint of heart.

Ill try again soon but must be better prepared for such major changes in the environment.

TG

[crelf]

Ill try again soon but must be better prepared for such major changes in the environment.

You might want to hang on for a little while for the next version to come - I assume that it'll be pretty soon...

[madison]

i jumped into 8.0 early because it made sense w/regard to work and schedule; however, i agree with the words of caution by so many on the list. major growing pains in application building with the new project. build and rebuild and uninstall and build again... you'll understand the drill soon if you upgrade and have to do more than just the usual exe (toss in some system files and active x server and special paths...). and yes, can sympathize with a few non-trivial crashes too... drive you to :beer: :laugh:

i was really worried when the 8.0.1 release came out and i had to start the recompile right before bed time (very long fix!). now, as i ponder the poll, i am really asking myself if i should jump into 8.2?? (anybody have any encouraging words to bolster my enthusiasm?) could some of these problems go away?? i don't know but i'm probably going to take my own advice and wait a while, and watch the list. i'll keep pushing the envelope at the 8.0.1 front meanwhile... cheers!

[Albert Geven]

i'll keep pushing the envelope at the 8.0.1 front meanwhile... cheers!

I have the strong feeling that 8.2 solves many of the 8.01 problems and adds some new ones.

look in the 8.2 buglist

I would not yet advise upgrading from 7.1.1 to 8.2 if you don't need the new stuff

but I will advise to upgrade from 8.01 to 8.2

The only thing that gets hinders us is that we need an installation of the runtime environment before we can run any 8.2 program.

So we keep our LabVIEW installer program written in LabVIEW in a lower version.