Please put LV and Deepfish togeher!

[Jan Florjanczyk]

Hello LV Forums!

First post I'm working with LV 8.2.1 this summer and I was hoping to put this idea out there: I would really like to have continous zoom in and out of my block diagrams. And now the technology to do so is here! Microsoft Live Labs (currently developing Photosynth as well) is working on Deepfish which was recently demoed at TED Talks: http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/129 and is also on their site: http://labs.live.com/deepfish/ . It's reminiscent of the way Safari on iPhone browses webpages but am I the only one who thinks this would be amazing for block diagrams?

Cheers

Jan

[Michael Aivaliotis]

Just went through the Microsoft demo. The LabVIEW block diagram is a different beast than the web browser. It seems a bit of a stretch in my opinion. Also, this is designed to shrink screens down, is this what you are asking? Shrink large block diagrams down to size? As far as I can tell this technology is not meant for any desktop application. The concept however is still valid and a very interesting one. Thanks for the link.

[Jan Florjanczyk]

I think it would be both for zooming in and zooming out. For example: instead of having a box representing your sub-VI, you could have the sub-VI block diagram embedded into the main VI and simply use zoom functions to access the sub-VI. There was a lot of discussion on another thread I was reading about making LabVIEW work in 3D. I think an implementation of this nature would fill that need. In effect, we don't need an extra dimension in our block diagrams, we just need more space without compromising the general shape/structure of wiring layouts.

Primarily I think Deepfish could be useful because it renders vector graphics, which would mean that going from Block Diagram to Pixmap or vector graphics could be done. And from there on, you'd basically be using the Deepfish rendering engine. I'm not actually entirely how the block diagram is rendered? Does NI release this information? It's proprietary I bet, but it's pretty interesting.

I'll keep reading! Thanks!

[Michael Aivaliotis]

I actually like using subvi's because I can open them in their own window. I can put one on one monitor and another monitor and so on. I like viewing multiple VI windows independently. Also, you lose the modularity with your approach. It's a lot easier to reuse code and debug problems when you use subvi's. Perhaps we can still use subvi's but have a special viewing mode that - when switched on - you can zoom into the subvi diagram and see what's inside instead of opening it. Perhaps this is what you meant. If so, I agree.

[LAVA 1.0 Content]

I'm not sure exactly how the block diagram is rendered, but I remembered reading on the NI forums that your block diagram objects should stay within 7500 pixels of the center of the diagram.

http://forums.ni.com/ni/board/message?boar...ding&page=2

[Yair]

QUOTE(Jan Florjanczyk @ Jul 17 2007, 08:30 PM)

I'm not actually entirely how the block diagram is rendered? Does NI release this information? It's proprietary I bet, but it's pretty interesting.

The data itself is saved in the VI as a hierarchy of objects, where each structure has its own subdiagram.

I'm guessing that the images of the primitives and the wires are bitmaps which are changed according to how you wire the diagram. SubVIs obviously are and so are external nodes. I'm assuming that Xnodes are the same, but I haven't checked it.

P.S. Jan, is that an xkcd comic?

[Jan Florjanczyk]

You are correct! Is that Optimus Prime ?

[Yair]

Actually, technically I think it's not , but we'll let that one slide.

[LAVA 1.0 Content]

QUOTE(Michael_Aivaliotis @ Jul 17 2007, 01:50 PM)

Perhaps we can still use subvi's but have a special viewing mode that - when switched on - you can zoom into the subvi diagram and see what's inside instead of opening it.

Aristos mentioned that the VI hierearchy window needs updating; this would be an awsome feature! I just loaded Ubuntu and Beryl on my clunker PC last night, and though slow, it made me smile... I think there is alot that could be done to make the VI hierarchy more useful.