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LabVIEW features that nobody uses

I propose: Tools > Security > Login

 

Does anyone use the LabVIEW Account Management stuff?? I presume that's what this is afterall! Smiley Very Happy

Thoric (CLA, CLED, CTD and LabVIEW Champion)


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Message 11 of 27
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Interesting thread.  Witch prompted me to scan through some of the less frequently used menu items and generated a possible "Feature" request.  

 

View>>Getting Started Window...

 

Handy if you want features accessable easilly from the GSW like; Rss scroll, Access to "Pinned" items, Instant access to Tech support, IDN.... Basically all the reasons the GSW is in it's current form.  

 

BUT, the GSW launches Modal from View>>Getting Started Window...

 

Now, how hard would it be to launch it "Floating" from that entry point instead? (About two minutes for an intern plus all the documentation time)   I should have thought about that before!  It would easilly promote the selection to one I would have a custom menu short-cut assigned to.  As it is.... not so handy.

 

What do you guys think?  Should this go to the Idea Exchange or the CAR database?


"Should be" isn't "Is" -Jay
Message 12 of 27
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Jeff,

 

That is a good idea. It will need to go to IE because the current behavior is undoubtedly "expected" behavior, even if it might be better described as expected mis-behavior.

 

Lynn

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Message 13 of 27
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@Thoric wrote:

I propose: Tools > Security > Login

 

Does anyone use the LabVIEW Account Management stuff?? I presume that's what this is afterall! Smiley Very Happy


Believe it or not I actually used this on a program once.  Generally I try to stick with Windows security for applications, and just ask Windows what level, or groups the user is in to enable features.  For some reason that wouldn't work for a particular customer (can't remember really) so it was either use the in house user management software, or use this and rely on NI to do it for me.  In the end I think the customer didn't really want or need security and would just always login with the highest level but as long as I gave him the tools to lockout others he was happy.

 

I was also going to say the units feature but someone else beat me to it.

 

What about Revision History?  I believe there are some people that use it but I've never met them.  I remember seeing an SVN addon that would read the SVN revision and write it into the VI's revision.  I thought how cool and all but would never use it.

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Message 14 of 27
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@Thoric wrote:

@Bob_Y. wrote:

Units.

 

On occasion I have tried to use units in numerics but it gets so complicated to do anything that I quickly give up.


The units feature is awesome! However, I agree it can get complicated so it's been a long time since I used it.


 

I absolutely love units specially to do conversions. Some of the simpliest code for really complicated events comes from that. For example. This VI converts any number/unit string into the base unit (Not 100% SI, but close for what we needed)

 

Units.png

 

 

 

 

 

 

Certified-LabVIEW-Architect_rgb.jpgCertified_TestStand_Architect_rgb.jpg


"I won't be wronged. I won't be insulted. I won't be laid a-hand on. I don't do these things to other people, and I require the same from them." John Bernard Books

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Message 15 of 27
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I'm not saying units are useful.  I'm saying few people use them because it feels like an incomplete feature.  Not all math functions support it, and when one doesn't it might take some time figuring out where your equation went wrong.  Here is one recent post where it fell short on the posters expected functionality.

 

This got me thinking about other features that I don't use because they aren't complete in my opinion.  The Silver controls is one of those.  Don't get me wrong I have used silver controls a few times on UIs.  But because there are controls in other palettes that aren't in the silver, I try to avoid them.  I'd rather have all controls of the same type then 90% silver and 10% other.  

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Message 16 of 27
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A very serious problem with the convert unit tool is that it looks absolutely identical to an expression node.

 

This can lead to serious miscommunications.

 

For example, Gerd posted the following image here

 

 

and the OP reconstructed it using an expression node instead of convert unit.

 

So, what's the problem? Well, the expression node accepts any kind of long string without error and simply treats it as variable.

 

For example the following expression node does not break the VI and simply returns the original value on the output. When the OP entered "deg" into the expression node, seemingly faithfully copying the code in the picture, all he got was a NOOP. No broken VI, no indication of errors.

 

 

I think it would deserve a LabVIEW idea (stay tuned) to make "convert unit" and "expression node" visually distinguishable to avoid problems like this. In a worst case scenario, a mistake like this could cost a few hours of debugging time.

 

Both nodes below are valid. One is an expression node and one is convert unit. you tell me which is which!

 

 

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Message 17 of 27
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I agree they should not look the same, however I get around it by (almost) never using an expression node.  I don't use units all that often either, but in some situations they are incredibly useful - just need to watch for the holes in what is supported.

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Message 18 of 27
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@altenbach wrote:

...

I think it would deserve a LabVIEW idea (stay tuned) to make "convert unit" and "expression node" visually distinguishable to avoid problems like this. In a worst case scenario, a mistake like this could cost a few hours of debugging time.


New idea posted here.

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Message 19 of 27
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I'm looking at the expression node myself, out of curiosity, and see from the Help that you can use "sizeOfDim" to return the array dimension size. However, the expression node doesn't accept arrays, so how can you use this command?

 

I was wondering if it would make a simpler/tighter way to get the nth dimension size of an array, instead of pairing Array Size and then Index Array primitives, which is quite real-estate hungry.

Thoric (CLA, CLED, CTD and LabVIEW Champion)


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Message 20 of 27
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