BASICS! what is ".vi"?

[WeAreAllFreeTechSupportNow]

i have mega old equpiment and devices, specifically windows 2000, scopes, and a gbpi-enet-100.

i have an .EXE.  when it is running it claims to be using myprogram.vi.  ".vi" seems to be a file type associated with national instruments labview (which i do not have, do not know what it is, and will not buy because i am trying to tape something together for anther year, we do not want to develop custom software again)

this .exe wont run in many ways, but it seems closest to running when on another old machine (NT).  it gives the same sorts of errors my working computer gives when i unplug the netowrk cable. (it seems to say i can't find my target device).

my guess is that all i have to do is tell the .exe where the devices are.  but it seems like there is no way to do this, and it seems like this device finding is handled by  "other native instruments software".  i have ni 488.2 (from 2000) installed, most of it seems to do nothing, but "ip assignment" finds a device that does have "NI" in its name (but i have 2 devices).

to be clear, i do have a (still) working system.  the gbip devices have IP assigned already. i do not want to reassign thier IP. will i break things if i reassign from anther computer?

Is this normal for national instruments devices from around 2000?  it really feels like i am missing a piece, but as far as i can understand from reading the forums and stuff, even things like critical drivers are licenced on a per install basis? do really need to buy a driver from 15 years ago?  it seems also like maybe this .exe cannot function unless it was "installed" by labview in some way? would i need labview from 15 years ago? would i ned to buy that too?

my end goal is for operators to see if a spectrum is present or absent at this time, nothing fancy at all.  you might ask "why not just put the spectrum analyzer on the desk?"  which is the right question, that is what i should do, but i am at work, so i cannot do the logical thing.  they really want me to make things "work like they always have".  is there no simple utilites available for national instruments equpiment? i get that it is very nice, fine grained equipment, but i am looking for red-light/green-light kind of stuff.  if my scope is old enough to only use gbip, is custom software the only way to use it remotely?

[crossrulz]

In general, you need to install the Run Time Engine for the LabVIEW version the exe was built for.  The RATE and drivers are free.  You just need to figure out which version to install.

[Minions]

I am thinking this is using LabVIEW 6.x or earlier for a system designed in 2000.  Not sure that LabVIEW 7.0 was released back then.

[Henrik_Volkers]

Is there an *.ini together with the *.exe?

a grep for the term [Ll][Aa][Bb][Vv][Ii][Ee][Ww] migth resolve the version info 🙂

or just open the .exe with an editor (notepad++) and search for labview ... some version info migth rise

[JÞB]

Time traveling through your posts and glancing at you mandate to "Future Proof" your system I can provide the following information.

A VI is a "Virtual Instrument" of the basic code module of LabVIEW.

The LabVIEW Run-Time Engine is needed to execute an application built from the LabVIEW Development environment.  You will need the LabVIEW 5.0 RTE to run the executable.  This executable will not run on a modern OS.  Frankly, I'm surprised it runs on an NT (are you sure you are not on a Win ME machine?)

In addition to the RTE you need some means to assign address data to the devices you are talking to.  It is unlikely that the original source used VISA so you will need to work with the underlying NI 488.2 hardware driver.  The 488.2 driver will need to be installed on the PC as well.  What version is not known but, you should be able to find that information on the working PC.  T & M Explorer is an old version of hardware configuration utility.  You will need to have that on the machine too. (it may install along with the 488.2 driver.

You cannot recover the source code from an executable- if you do not have source code in a format you can read you will need to start again.  That 5.25" floppy is a bit obsolete and I wouldn't know how to find a drive for it.

Essentially, there is no way to make a LabVIEW 5.0 written application future proof.

That is the bad news.  The good news is this.  Its a very simple application that should take nearly no time to re-write for a modern system.  Better, there are several NI Alliance Partners and Certified LabVIEW Consultants that can help you.  

[WeAreAllFreeTechSupportNow]

word up hinrik;

i can see that it was created with labview 5.0. i think i even found the base "widget" the program was built from, it looks like a national instruments cookie cutter that we "customized" by putting out logo on it and maybe a couple other tweeks.

the problem i am having is finding the "runtime enviroment" for this program.  i have been trying to find labview 5.0 on the website, but all i find are patches, not the program or a runtime enviroment.  same problem for labview 6, 7, 8.

a cold and wet hellow from canada

[WeAreAllFreeTechSupportNow]

yeah, "find and install the runtime envoroment" has been the consensus, my problem is i cannot find said runtime enviroment. i can see the program was built with labview 5.0, but on the NI website all i find is patches from labview 5.0, no base program or runtime environment.  same for slightly higher versions (6-8).

i have even opened a ticket with NI, but we dont have a service contract, so i dont think they want to talk to me. 

[AnalogKid2DigitalMan]

Closest RTE I could dig up on the ftp site was 5.1, see here:

ftp://ftp.ni.com/support/labview/runtime/Windows%20-%20Alias/5.1/

Not sure if it is LabVIEW 5.0 compatible, could give it a try?

Or if you have  LabVIEW 5.0 and the 5.1 update then the 5.1 RTE would work.

-AK2DM

[WeAreAllFreeTechSupportNow]

Well, thanks for the suggestion, i did try it.  however, my program is still complaining about "a code library required by visa is could not be located or loaded".

i do have visa 4 and visa runtime 4 both installed, as well as current visa running on a windows 7 machine i have been testing with as well.  in windows 7 it says something like "the error code does not exist and or is totally wrong", while in XP, 2000, NT it always complains about missing visa libraries. 

i actually began with a bunch of visa and none of it helped, and this is how i ended up looking for labview runtime hoping this missing libraries might be there.

are visa and max the same thing? i also have max installed.

are national instruments software packages not backwards compatible? like, do they exclude non-current libraries? 

thanks for your help regardless