New 2014 LabVIEW Champion: Rob Humfeld

[Hunka]

Member Profile - Rob Humfeld

Name: Rob Humfeld ("10Things_Rob")

Home: Columbia, MO
Programming Languages: LabVIEW, tidbits of others that really don't count
Certifications: CLA, CTA, CPI

Used LabVIEW Since: 1992 (v2.2?)

Applications Areas:

I've designed, implemented, and integrated software for a wide range of projects in fields including telecom, material testing, medical devices, machine control, instrumentation testing, automated production, and HIL simulation. But if you ask me, it's these cool projects that I like to talk about most: Flight Data Processor, Automated Welding Control Systems, Robotic “Stealth” Test System, Heart Valve/Stent Endurance Testers, Miniature Earth-Moving Robot, Bio-reactor Control System, or Ocular Surgery System Validation.

Biography:

I grew up in (and with) the Northern Virginia suburbs west of Washington, D.C. Reston, VA to be specific. I attended Virginia Tech from 1988-1993, including a year-long intermission as an exchange student in Braunschweig, Germany. Graduating in 1993 with B.S. In Engineering Mechanics, I took a year-long internship at Oak Ridge National Lab, there meeting my eventual wife. I returned to VT for grad school, and I blame canoeing and fishing on the New River for taking four years to complete a M.S. in Engineering Mechanics. I lived and worked for two years in Chicago before moving to Columbia, MO in 1999 to get married. Now we've got three kids and the family is loving life in Columbia. When you see me sometime, ask me about the True/False Film Festival, the Pedaler's Jamboree, or my family's love of travel.

It was the Summer of 1992 in a lab at VT that I was introduced to LabVIEW. My department had purchased FIVE copies of LabVIEW for $250. When I met the professor with whom I had taken a Summer internship, he handed me a box. "This is some program for labs called LabVIEW. We just got it and I don't know anything about it. But supposedly you can use it to talk to our tensile strength test machine. I want you to try to automate one of the grad students' tests. I am going to Taiwan on sabbatical. See you in the Fall". I have used LabVIEW ever since. The rest of my undergrad career, Oak Ridge, grad school, and as a full-time professional with Alliance Member companies. I am now CTO of JET Engineering (http://www.jetinc.net) in Cedar Rapids, IA.

I've long had a passion for teaching and training, so although I've worked on a lot of cool projects, my proudest claim to fame is that I have mentored 12 eventual CLAs. LabVIEW Champion Mark Balla, David Asher, Jonathan Olson, Bryan Kennedy, Lee Brewington, Roberto Lanzara, Paul Woerther, Kent Wedeking, Brandyn Adderley, Tyler Heikes, Madan Rajendran, and Chris Vincent. Number 13 is working hard and should be there soon.

Other random facts about my life as an NI groupie: I'm also a CTA and VeriStand expert. The first CLA-level programmer I ever worked under preceded me as a LabVIEW Champion: Mr. Saverio Mercurio. My 2005 talk "10 Things I Hate about LabVIEW" was attended by Jeff Kodosky. It was also directly responsible for the 4-2-2-4 connector pane being the default for new VIs. I was co-chair of the CLA Summit 2012, and chair in 2013. I created an architecture for my first CLA Summit in 2011 called JAMA, which LabVIEW Champion Mark Balla and I (mostly Mark) developed further into the Message Routing Architecture which eventually found its way into the NI's Advanced Architectures course. You can find the original code on LAVA:  http://lavag.org/topic/14566-message-routing-architecture/?p=87358. Since then I've reworked JAMA and it is the basis for all LabVIEW development at JET.

I'm honored to be selected as a LabVIEW Champion.

Professional Presentations:

NI Week 2004: Reducing Development Time by Improving Debugging Skills in LabVIEW

NI Week 2004: Developing More Powerful Applications using State Machine Architectures in LabVIEW

NI Week 2005: 10 Things I Hate about LabVIEW

NI Week 2005: Beyond "The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly"

NI Week 2006: 10 Things I Hate about LabVIEW

CLA Summit 2011: JAMA

CLA Summit 2013: Delivering Professional Software

[CRoebuck]

Awesome to see this Rob. Well done. Your JAMA presentation 3 years ago was the push I needed to get my head into LVOOP, I owe you thanks (I think 😉

[FabiolaDelaCueva]

Congratulations Rob, what took you so long? Just kidding, great to have you in the team. It was a pleasure to work with you on organizing the CLA Summit and I hope I get to work with you on a LabVIEW project one day.

[MarkBalla-Tecnova]

It's Great to have you as a Champion. Thanks for being the guy that taught me LabVIEW and for your JAMA presentation that took my development in a whole new direction.

[Mark_Yedinak]

Welcome aboard Rob!