How to write SCC Plugin for LabVIEW project

[Abdullah R]

We are using Design Sync as our company wide SCC which LabVIEW 8.x does not support in project environment. Does anybody know

1- If there is a way to write your own SCC plugin for LabVIEW project that would perform checkin/checkout etc operations on the files in project without users going through the command like interface of the SCC we use?

2- If there is a way, can somebody point me to right direction? How to get started on writing your own plugin?

Thanks

Abdullah R

[Tomi Maila]

QUOTE(paracha3 @ Aug 24 2007, 06:05 AM)

We are using Design Sync as our company wide SCC which LabVIEW 8.x does not support in project environment. Does anybody know...

There is no need to integrate SCC solution to LabVIEW project. May of the LAVA users are using Tortoise SVN for their SCC client. Tortoise SVN is not integrated to LabVIEW project; rather it's integrated to windows explorer. Bottom line is that if you find a SCC client for your SCC server that simply is able to 1) properly synchronize your folders with the SCC server and 2) allows you to use third party diff and merge tools then you should be able to use your SCC server.

As most of the SCC servers also have a stand-alone client, I guess you are better off using one of those rather than trying to integrate with LV project. However if you insist integrating with LV project, I guess LV is compatible with MS visual source safe compatible servers. So you can write a wrapper that acts like a MS visual source safe server for LabVIEW direction and as Design Sync client for the server direction. Or maybe there is already a MS Visual Source Safe interface in Design Sync....

Tomi

[Rolf Kalbermatter]

QUOTE(paracha3 @ Aug 23 2007, 10:05 PM)

We are using Design Sync as our company wide SCC which LabVIEW 8.x does not support in project environment. Does anybody know

1- If there is a way to write your own SCC plugin for LabVIEW project that would perform checkin/checkout etc operations on the files in project without users going through the command like interface of the SCC we use?

2- If there is a way, can somebody point me to right direction? How to get started on writing your own plugin?

Thanks

Abdullah R

Tomi has been right with all his recommendations. No need to use a Visual Source Safe compatible interface, unless you want to invoke the source code control actions directly from within LabVIEW. In my experience using SVN with Tortoise SVN however works actually better. Of course you need some discipline but that is in the nature of source code control anyhow.

One extra note, if you really want to access your source code control system directly from within LabVIEW you do need a Visual Source Safe compatible interface plugin. LabVIEW simply interfaces to that API and accepts any compatible source code provider that has been registered in the system. If you can't find a commercial interface for your SCC (but if it is popular at all in any means you probably can) you would have to write it yourself. From what I understand it is not to difficult to do that but the API is considered proprietary information by MS and you only get it by signing an NDA, or at least that was the situation last time I checked into this.

Rolf Kalbermatter

[Ton Plomp]

QUOTE(rolfk @ Aug 24 2007, 10:44 AM)

Tomi has been right with all his recommendations. No need to use a Visual Source Safe compatible interface, unless you want to invoke the source code control actions directly from within LabVIEW. In my experience using SVN with Tortoise SVN however works actually better. Of course you need some discipline but that is in the nature of source code control anyhow.

One extra note, if you really want to access your source code control system directly from within LabVIEW you do need a Visual Source Safe compatible interface plugin. LabVIEW simply interfaces to that API and accepts any compatible source code provider that has been registered in the system. If you can't find a commercial interface for your SCC (but if it is popular at all in any means you probably can) you would have to write it yourself. From what I understand it is not to difficult to do that but the API is considered proprietary information by MS and you only get it by signing an NDA, or at least that was the situation last time I checked into this.

Rolf Kalbermatter

I like the SCC in LabVIEW. The project gives you a good view of what the status of the files are.

PushOK has a tool to create a http://www.pushok.com/soft_svn.php' target="_blank">MS SCC proxy interface to SVN haven't figured out if there's a trial license, but will try it tonight.

(a license costs just €19)

Ton

[gmart]

After some searching, I found this article - http://www.matrixone.com/pdf/ds_designsync.pdf. Here's the relevant bullet to this post:

Plug-in for Source Code Control for Software

Components

ENOVIA Synchronicity DesignSync includes a plugin

for the Microsoft Visual Studio IDE (Integrated

Development Environment.)

So, since this plugin exists, in theory, you should be able to hook into it from within LabVIEW. Give that a try and let us know how it worked for you.

[Ton Plomp]

QUOTE(tcplomp @ Aug 24 2007, 11:46 AM)

I like the SCC in LabVIEW. The project gives you a good view of what the status of the files are.

PushOK has a tool to create a MS SCC proxy interface to SVN haven't figured out if there's a trial license, but will try it tonight.

(a license costs just €19)

It works! I can browse my own repository with LabVIEW :thumbup:

There's a trial license for a period of time (which I don't know)

So that's great news!

Only the 'Show Differences' doesn't work.

Does anyone have used this with an SCC?

Maybe I can try it with the LabVIEW VI to do the diff.

QUOTE(gmart @ Aug 24 2007, 02:06 PM)

After some searching, I found this article -

So, since this plugin exists, in theory, you should be able to hook into it from within LabVIEW. Give that a try and let us know how it worked for you.

As my post shows it will most likely work!

Ton

[Tomi Maila]

QUOTE(gmart @ Aug 24 2007, 03:06 PM)

Plug-in for Source Code Control for Software

Components

ENOVIA Synchronicity DesignSync includes a plugin

for the Microsoft Visual Studio IDE (Integrated

Development Environment.)

So, since this plugin exists, in theory, you should be able to hook into it from within LabVIEW. Give that a try and let us know how it worked for you.

Actually I think this is a plugin that makes Visual Studio to speak DesignSync protocol. We'd need a plugin that makes DesignSync to speak MS Visual Source Safe protocol. So I guess this plugin is of no help in this situation.

Tomi

[gmart]

QUOTE(tcplomp @ Aug 24 2007, 11:34 AM)

It works! I can browse my own repository with LabVIEW :thumbup:

There's a trial license for a period of time (which I don't know)

So that's great news!

Only the 'Show Differences' doesn't work.

Does anyone have used this with an SCC?

Maybe I can try it with the LabVIEW VI to do the diff.

As my post shows it will most likely work!

Ton

Trying to convince a LAVA guy who uses Tortoise SVN to use anything else is not a winning proposition I have found . The PushOk plugin seems to allow the basic operations. Perhaps it has more advanced functionality, but most of that was not tested with the integration to LabVIEW. I believe Show Differences was tried and it did work. I'm not sure why it would not work (unless they've changed something in the meantime). I'd say keep working with the plugin to see if it satisfies your current needs. Obviously if it does not, there's other alternatives.

[Abdullah R]

The only reason i wanted to write a plugin is because LabVIEW project shows you nice status of each file in project view. Also (not sure about this one) doesn't labview also automatically checkout all the called subVIs when you check you the top level caller? And also i think as soon as you start editing a checkin VI, that it prompts you like "This VI is checked in do you want to check it out? YES NO?".

I agree those are nice to have features. I am comfortable with DesignSync command line interface but the engineers who will be working with this will definitely find it hard because they have no previous exp with SCC what so ever. I just wanted to make it easy for them to do SCC operations from within LabVIEW env.

I guess i will have to write some utility VIs that would nicely wrap the commands for check in and check out etc.

Thanks for all who responded.

[gmart]

QUOTE(paracha3 @ Aug 30 2007, 04:35 PM)

The only reason i wanted to write a plugin is because LabVIEW project shows you nice status of each file in project view. Also (not sure about this one) doesn't labview also automatically checkout all the called subVIs when you check you the top level caller? And also i think as soon as you start editing a checkin VI, that it prompts you like "This VI is checked in do you want to check it out? YES NO?".

I agree those are nice to have features. I am comfortable with DesignSync command line interface but the engineers who will be working with this will definitely find it hard because they have no previous exp with SCC what so ever. I just wanted to make it easy for them to do SCC operations from within LabVIEW env.

I guess i will have to write some utility VIs that would nicely wrap the commands for check in and check out etc.

Thanks for all who responded.

You are correct in regards to the benefits of using the source control integration within LabVIEW. The status indications are good. I think one of the most helpful features is the prompting on edits. This feature helps me not have to worry about remembering to check out the file I'm working with as well as can display calllers of a certain file so that if you change a connector pane, the callers will get checked out as well.

Sorry there is not a better solution for you in regards to DesignSync. I would try to contact them (if you haven't already) to see if they do have a plugin for third party IDE's before giving up all hope