topic Re: Code Capture Tool in BreakPoint

Code Capture Tool

TCPlomp — Mon, 04 Jun 2007 05:50:27 GMT

I see more and more people asking about how to paste parts of LV code in forums.
I'm thinking about repacking the Code Capture Tool as an .OGP file and a auto-installing VI.
Together with this I want to write some documentation about it.
Now my Q is does anybody resemble this?
Esp. tst, Chilly Charly, Altenbach, Jean-Pierre and RolfK!

One bug-fix to make is the shooting of paned front panels.

My current version is 8.2 but I think the version on the net is 7.1 right?
Does anyone have an older version?

TOn

Re: Code Capture Tool

tst — Mon, 04 Jun 2007 10:06:00 GMT

I doubt people will have any objection and I think it's a great idea. While the tool was originally posted to the Starware thread, the point is not to have it only in places where the writers can get stars, but to get as many people to use it as possible. I would also suggest alternative means of distribution like the LAVAcr and OpenG itself (with the BSD license?).

As for technical issues, the current version is 7.0. I think it should stay that way, if only because it's the version I use . I can help with compiling that. All the 8.x stuff is called dynamically and so adding the code to handle panes (as well as the library names) should be done dynamically as well. We should have a tree VIs which will hold all the dynamically called VIs so that it can be compiled easily on newer versions.

Also, I think that it should have some changes made to it.
Personally, I think some of the additions are not needed and just complicate the program (like using the number buttons to cycle the lists or having the timeout) and unless anyone has objections I suggest that we remove them.
Also, the code which does the actual cropping was never cleaned up and this could be a good chance to do that.
One important addition is the ability to select the position of the FP and BD relative to each other. Maybe from a picture ring?

BTW, what is your suggestion for working with panes?
Can you select objects across multiple panes?

Re: Code Capture Tool

TCPlomp — Mon, 04 Jun 2007 11:06:36 GMT

LAVAcr and OpenG itself (with the BSD license?).

I like that, since we have control over the documentation!

One important addition is the ability to select the position of the FP and BD relative to each other. Maybe from a picture ring?

Sounds good!

BTW, what is your suggestion for working with panes?
Can you select objects across multiple panes?

I think you can select, the problem is that currently you get an error if you want to use the whole panel (mult. panes)

One addition I want is the 'escape' key, that is quite intuitive to cancel a dialog

Ton

Re: Code Capture Tool

tst — Mon, 04 Jun 2007 12:33:25 GMT

TonP wrote:

I think you can select, the problem is that currently you get an error if you want to use the whole panel (mult. panes)

Well, it's important to know whether you can select across multiple panes or not, because that would significantly affect the behavior of the tool.
In any case, I don't use 8, but I would expect that this should be a fairly simple fix and that if there is no selection the tool should capture the visible part of each pane and combine them into a single image.

One addition I want is the 'escape' key, that is quite intuitive to cancel a dialog

Sounds good. I just never had to cancel that dialog much, so I didn't think about it.

Attached is a picture ring prototype.

Re: Code Capture Tool

Darren — Mon, 04 Jun 2007 14:33:44 GMT

@tst wrote:

While the tool was originally posted to the Starware thread, the point is not to have it only in places where the writers can get stars, but to get as many people to use it as possible. I would also suggest alternative means of distribution like the LAVAcr and OpenG itself (with the BSD license?).

I would suggest posting the utility to the NI Community website.

-D

Re: Code Capture Tool

tst — Mon, 04 Jun 2007 20:47:40 GMT

What actually is the problem with panes?
I ran the FP.Get Image Scaled method and it returns an image of all the panes.

If the problem is that you don't see parts of the pane which are not currently visible, I'm not sure what can be done about that. There doesn't seem to be an exposed way of getting the full image of a pane and I don't know how to play with scripting in 8.x.

Re: Code Capture Tool

TCPlomp — Tue, 05 Jun 2007 06:50:41 GMT

Tst,

I don't have time right now but debugged it a little, the panel.top property fails in a multi-pane panel.
Rearrenging the order of elements in the property can bypass this. After that only a selection in the second (or more) pane will cause a wrong image.
You are right that you can't select elements accross panes.
I like your ring!

Darren,

how much control do we have on the NI site?

Ton

Re: Code Capture Tool

Darren — Tue, 05 Jun 2007 15:16:11 GMT

@TonP wrote:

how much control do we have on the NI site?

To my knowledge, you can freely edit anything you post to the NI Community site. I think that's the whole point of it, to encourage code sharing. You can check out the History Probes utility I posted to see an example of what (I hope) a typical post on there would look like.

-D

Re: Code Capture Tool

tst — Thu, 21 Jun 2007 14:54:17 GMT

Were you able to make any progress?

Re: Code Capture Tool

TCPlomp — Thu, 21 Jun 2007 17:32:27 GMT

Sorry tst,

not yet, some things roll just the other way.

But I was thinking to abuse the OGP power to include several versions of the same VI for several LV releases (pre 8.x don't need panes, 8.x can natively export strings etc)

I think I'll set a deadline in the first week of august (do I hear NI week?).
My (most likely) release version will be 7.1 or 6.1 if someone can back save to 6.1 (tst?)

Ton

Re: Code Capture Tool

tst — Thu, 21 Jun 2007 17:58:18 GMT

@TonP wrote:

if someone can back save to 6.1 (tst?)

Yes, if things are supported there.

I'm interested in how you're planning on doing the different versions. I noticed that VIPM let's you choose between different versions of the same package, but how are you planning on doing the version numbering?

Re: Code Capture Tool

TCPlomp — Fri, 22 Jun 2007 06:51:55 GMT

Here's an OGP that install a different enum for different LabVIEW version:
For version 6.1 and up the enum will only have a value of 6.1 for 8.2.1 and up it wil have a value of 6.1 and 8.2.1
The same can be done for operating systems.

Added as .zip so you can look at it and see what happens. Just rename to .ogp to install

Ton

Re: Code Capture Tool

tst — Fri, 22 Jun 2007 07:22:53 GMT

OK, I think I understand - you can control what happens with each file inside the installation depending on your LV version. That's really nice. It would have been nice if we could also define a mass compile step at the end of the installation.

BTW, there is a problem with your example (I understand it's just a quick one). File Group 1 is exclusive to 6.1 so 7.0 to 8.2 don't get the enum extracted. I assume it is possible to include both a larger than and a smaller than condition for the same files.

Re: Code Capture Tool

TCPlomp — Tue, 26 Jun 2007 17:53:05 GMT

Hi Tst,

you're correct the possibilities are endless (sort of)....

Could you upload a 6.1 version?

Ton

Re: Code Capture Tool

tst — Tue, 26 Jun 2007 18:55:38 GMT

@TonP wrote:

Could you upload a 6.1 version?

Tomorrow, yes, but don't you want to fix it first?

I would still vote for getting rid of the timeout and the keys for cycling (unless I hear any objections).

P.S. are you planning on attempting to clean up the mess inside the VI which creates the images?

Re: Code Capture Tool

TCPlomp — Tue, 26 Jun 2007 19:56:13 GMT

@tst wrote:
Tomorrow, yes, but don't you want to fix it first?

I would still vote for getting rid of the timeout and the keys for cycling (unless I hear any objections).

P.S. are you planning on attempting to clean up the mess inside the VI which creates the images?

I have fixed it by debugging some things.
What is the problem with the timeout? It can be usefull for incapsulating the tool inside another VI (for documentation purposes), the cycle keys are just a nice gimmick.

I think I'll try to clean up the VIs since this will be a major hobby-during-the-summer project.

Ton

Re: Code Capture Tool

tst — Tue, 26 Jun 2007 20:51:28 GMT

How about we move it to email?

You should have my address from Info LabVIEW.

Re: Code Capture Tool

TCPlomp — Thu, 08 Nov 2007 18:24:04 GMT

The tool has been finished after weeks of hard labour, long emails and numerous commits to SF.

Finished by yours truly and Yen/tst the tool is released to LAVA

Have fun and add it to your Tools menu!

Ton