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Intaris

Highlight LabVIEW's "Easy to learn, difficult to master" status

Status: New

I thought a little bit about how this suggestion should be called.  I also feel that NI HAS improved in this area a bit in the last few years but regardless....

 

We all know that NI sells LV as being "Easy to use" or that people can "rapidly and cost-effectively interface with measurement and control hardware, analyze data, share results, and distribute systems" "regardless of experience".

 

What I (And I think many others) miss is that there's a serious side to using LV which can only be harnessed by experienced programmers.  I feel that NI should focus more on this "experience scaleability" of LabVIEW which makes it easy to learn but very difficult to master due to the incredible breadth of features and possibilities LV offers.  I'm not a marketing guy, so pelase don't ask me how to do this, but I think that maybe highlighting the software engineering side of LV development would help.  How about pushing examples of the classic software architectures or demonstrating some more advanced features which don't work "regardless of experience".

 

LabVIEW grows with any user's knowledge of software engineering and I just feel that this should be focussed on a bit more.

 

I'm interested to hear people's opinions.....

14 Comments
Broken_Arrow
Active Participant
I hear what you are saying, and agree. Learning LabVIEW is analogous to learning the piano. Anyone can sit down with a teacher and learn Chopsticks in one evening. From there, it's exponentially more difficult. However, what Is your Idea?
Richard






Intaris
Proven Zealot

It's more of a marketing thing.

 

I would like NI marketing to themselves treat LabVIEW as a  serious programming language.

 

That's all.

 

Shane.

Intaris
Proven Zealot

It's more of a marketing thing.

 

I would like NI marketing to themselves treat LabVIEW as a  serious programming language.

 

That's all.

 

Shane.

Ray.R
Knight of NI
I support you Shane.  You hit the target with this one.  The sales people are probably the worst ones to advertise LabVIEW as being so easy that a monkey (or caveman) can program using it.  Then you go to a potential client and they can't understand why you are trying to convince them that there is a difference between an experienced and novice programmer.  From my experience, they (clients) think that LabVIEW has everything already done for them.  - sigh -  I blame the sales people.
Broken_Arrow
Active Participant
Kudos. How many times have you looked at a question on the forums, and it's 95% Express VI's with no dataflow, undocumented DAQ Assistants, locals and globals, etc. Sure, it's "easy" to measure a thermocouple and display a value. Move beyond that, and ....
Richard






Ray.R
Knight of NI

Kudos as well...  Same things in the text-based language world.  Seems everyone is an expert.  Except me.  There was even one guy posting for a job as an advanced expert of some sort and he could never spell LabVIEW correctly.  He may (MAY) have used it once. 

 

If people want to take the LabVIEW software language seriously as a development platform, then they need to know that it is not a caveman language that already does everything.  

 

Actually this beef has been going on for a long time... I hope that this thread will be read and taken seriously.  I do my part at educating people that LabVIEW is a complete programming language and there's a difference between novice and advanced programmers.

Mark_Yedinak
Trusted Enthusiast
I agree wholeheartedly. I have often said essentially the same things in many posts. I do believe that NI is doing LabVIEW a disservice by not marketing the serious and professional side of LabVIEW programming. As long as they stick to marketing only as "easy to use" I don't think it will be viewed as a serious programming language.


Mark Yedinak
Certified LabVIEW Architect
LabVIEW Champion

"Does anyone know where the love of God goes when the waves turn the minutes to hours?"
Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald - Gordon Lightfoot
Intaris
Proven Zealot

I think this could go well with the idea proposed by Altenbach that NI provide a hobby version of LV.  NI can offer that version to the "no experience" people while holding back more "serious" software engineering tools for the professional version.  By touting the serious tools and the amazing things that can be done with it, this might generate revenue from people otherwise using the "hobby" version but wanting more.

 

This might allow NI to resolve the schizophrenic marketing relationship they seem to have to the current LV.

JackDunaway
Trusted Enthusiast

Intaris wrote:

I think this could go well with the idea proposed by Altenbach that NI provide a hobby version of LV.  NI can offer that version to the "no experience" people...


... then what do they offer the seasoned LabVIEWer who wants to program at home, or the laid-off or retired engineer looking to keep LabVIEW skills sharp, or the non-profit freeware projects? I would oppose the idea of that version becoming a "learner's" version or a pared-down toy.

 

The Home LabVIEW cannot be initially marketed to newbies - it has to fall into the hands of the professionals first. They will populate the internet with some good freeware apps, and it will turn heads - "Wow, I thought LabVIEW was a joke for programming LEGOS - I didn't know it could do that!" THAT is what's going to end up spreading the word about LabVIEW - it's already-rich community.

 

I think your marketing scheme is backwards. If anything, tout this version as being full-featured with professional tools. Say in the slogan, "Warning, for serious, professional programmers only", or whatever, it doesn't matter to me, just as long as this version is full-featured like the professional version. This is more likely to pique people's interest rather than saying, "Here's a learner's version, if you like it, we'll gladly take $4000 off your hands for a real version."

Intaris
Proven Zealot

Jack, the current train of thought regarding the "freemium" version of LV is that it would be targetted at people not wanting to earn money with LV.

 

I think most people who would be likely to claim LV is not a "serious" programming language would tend to use this version instead of the "professional" version.  I don't think NI should market it as you seem to have understood from my post at all.  I want exactly the opposite, I want NI to concentrate on the breadth of possibilities LV offers instead of only concentrating on the "no experience" selling point (which is valid enough if it's not the ONLY selling point).

 

Instead of saying "NI could offer that version to the no experience people" I should have said "The no experience people can satisfy their needs with that version".  I didn't mean to imply any marketing push from NI in this regard at all.  It's actually the other way around.  I'd love a world without the "no experience" selling point for LV at all.  But it's there and I don't think NI want to give that up completely.