Disallow changing the label of control references and implicit property/invoke nodes

[Darren]

Check out this nice readable diagram:

Whoa there pardner, not so fast. The control reference labeled "Numeric 1" is actually linked to the "Numeric 3" control. And the property node labeled "Numeric 2" is actually linked to the "Numeric 1" control. Etc., etc.

I see no reason to change the labels of Control References and Implicit Property/Invoke Nodes. If you need to document them beyond their label, attach a free label to them. We don't allow changing the labels of subVIs, so the precedent has been set. For the sake of diagram readability, we shouldn't allow changing labels of these objects either. 

[ben64]

I'm ok with not be able to rename reference and property nodes but if I create a control from a reference I would like to still be able to rename it.

[Darren]

> I'm ok with not be able to rename reference and property nodes but if I create a control from a reference I would like to still be able to rename it.

I assume you mean creating a reference control from a control reference? Those two items aren't linked in any way so it should be fine.

[Yamaeda]

I'm pretty sure i upgraded some old code which had the wrong labels and in the upgrade process it relinked to the controls with that name. Disabling the edit is a simple fix and a warning/error for mismatching label vs link.

/Y

[rwunderl]

I have some old code that has been upgraded many times over the past 10~15 years or so where the property node and reference labels have somehow freed themselves from their renaming obligation.

I mean that when I change the control's label (either on the front panel or on the diagram), the property nodes and references do not automatically rename (even though they presumably have never been renamed before as they had the same label text to begin with). This is quite annoying as I have to manually Find > Property Nodes and Find > References to verify all instances have the updated labels.

I suppose this breakage of the links is due to the repeated migration through many LabVIEW versions, but that is no excuse. If the Find > Whatever tool works, then the link is still there. So why doesn't the label get changed automatically?

So +1 to this idea of never letting them diverge.

And yes, I say rename all linked property nodes and references to the control's label. Any other use of those labels, even for scripting, sounds like a hack to me. Perhaps you'll want to start an Idea for adding Captions to Property Nodes? 😲