Web UI Builder Webcast: Attendee Q&A

[Michael_N.]

Thanks to all who attended the live LabVIEW virtual user group webcast on creating web-based user interfaces with LabVIEW Web UI Builder. If you missed the webcast, you can watch it on-demand.

Here is the Q&A from attendees. Feel free to add additional questions and/or add your feature requests to this discussion forum.

How do I create an account to use LabVIEW Web UI Builder?

To use LabVIEW Web UI Builder, you just need to create an NI Hosted Service account. This is free and should only take a couple of minutes. This new account is used instead of User Profiles in order to provide additional security. This security is necessary because users can save their projects to individual NI cloud storage locations while developing applications with LabVIEW Web UI Builder.

Can users import LabVIEW code into LabVIEW Web UI Builder (or vice versa)?

No, there is currently no way to import LabVIEW code into LabVIEW Web UI Builder, or vice versa. This feature will be considered for a future release.

Can you upload LabVIEW code snippets to the LabVIEW Web UI builder?

No, this feature isn’t supported currently.

Being a web-based product that provides cloud storage by default, does using LabVIEW Web UI Builder mean my code is NI intellectual property or public domain?

No, any code that a user creates using LabVIEW Web UI Builder belongs to him/her. NI does not own the IP.

Will LabVIEW Web UI Builder run on Linux?

Currently, LabVIEW Web UI Builder and applications created with it are not supported on Linux. There are efforts to port Silverlight to Linux (this technology is called Moonlight). However, Moonlight is not yet mature enough to allow LabVIEW Web UI Builder to run on Linux.

Which web browsers support LabVIEW Web UI Builder and/or applications created with it?

LabVIEW Web UI Builder is supported on any OS and in any browser that officially supports Microsoft Silverlight 4. This means that LabVIEW Web UI Builder and applications created with it are supported on Windows and Mac OS X desktop operating systems, and in the majority of popular web browsers (IE, Firefox, Chrome, Safari, etc.).

However, LabVIEW Web UI Builder applications are not yet supported on mobile devices like phones or tablets (with the exception of Windows tablets), which don’t run Silverlight 4. Several mobile platforms now support specialized mobile versions of Microsoft Silverlight (i.e. not the version required by LabVIEW Web UI Builder applications), so mobile support is likely achievable in a future release.

Is any software required to view an application created with LabVIEW Web UI Builder on the client side besides the Silverlight browser plug-in?

No, only the Silverlight 4 plug-in is required. 

Is there a way to simulate signals if there are no web services available at the moment?

It is possible to create arrays within an application created with LabVIEW Web UI Builder. If web services are unavailable, this could be used to simulate real data.

If I evaluate LabVIEW Web UI Builder and save my project my cloud storage account, can I retrieve this code alter if I buy a license?

Yes, you will still have access to any code you saved previously.

Can the controls and indicators be customized (i.e. custom images, change size of text, needle, colors, etc)?

The controls and indicators can be customized to some degree. There is not an editor for creating truly custom controls the way that users can in LabVIEW, but users generally have some control over colors and text size.

How will the panel resize when the browser is resized?

Depending on what the developer configures, the panel will either remain constant in size or scale with the size of the browser.

One of the examples on the LabVIEW Web UI Builder homepage had some rotating windmills . Is that using an animated GIF?

This example takes advantage of the animation feature in LabVIEW Web UI Builder. The windmill is just a regular JPEG image configured to use a rotation animation on. The editor supports basic animations on front panel objects such as rotation, scaling, translation etc

How can users share their code?

Users cat share their code by exporting it to their local machines and then sharing it through email. The export feature can be accessed by clicking the “jewel” button on the top left of the editor.

I am using LabVIEW 8.6.  Can I create web services that communicate with LabVIEW Web UI builder?

LabVIEW Web UI Builder can use web services that are built in LabVIEW 8.6. However, only users creating web services in LabVIEW 2009 and later can use the Import Web Service wizard to auto-generate the code needed to call the web service.

Are there NI-supplied examples that users can play with?

Yes, you can find NI-created examples by clicking here.

Which features do users have to pay for?

The only feature that requires a license is the ‘Build and Deploy Project’ wizards, which walks users through compiling code into a standalone web application. This license is available as a yearly software lease, which means it will enable the Build and Deploy Project feature in LabVIEW Web UI Builder available for one year. At the end of that year, the lease or subscription must be renewed in order to retain the ability to build and deploy standalone web applications.

What is the cost of a LabVIEW Web UI Builder license?

See the bottom of the main LabVIEW Web UI Builder page for information on pricing in your country.

Once a web executable is created, can a customer freely distribute the executable?

Yes, there are no licensing fees, run-time licenses or royalties associated with distributing applications created with LabVIEW Web UI Builder.

How can I evaluate the 'Build and Deploy' feature that requires a license?

Contact Mike Neal (LabVIEW Web UI Builder product manager at National Instruments) to request a trial license. Click here to send Mike an email.

[Michael_N.]

Here are some additional questions that didn't fit in the first post due to the forum's character limit:

Can some controls on the user interface be locked out based on a log-in? 
Yes, the developer can add code to programmatically disable a UI control based on a user log-in. See this example of implementing a login dialog.

Is NI Mathscript supported? 
No, not at this time.
 

Is TDMS read/write supported? 
No, Silverlight applications have the same restrictions as any web application (i.e. they run inside the browser “sandbox”) and cannot interact directly with the harddrive. It is possible that in the future this will be possible if the end user gives permission. To save to a harddrive now, you will need to implement a web service that accepts data and writes the data to disk.
 

Where can I find information on creating LabVIEW web services? 
The archived LabVIEW virtual user group on creating web services is available by clicking here. 

What advantages does UI Builder have over using a DataSocket connection for remote viewing? 
LabVIEW Web UI Builder applications provide rich, interactive user interafaces and can communicate with web services via HTTP (the most common, standard web communication protocol). DataSocket is an NI-only protocol, and is usually associated with "thick client" LabVIEW applications.
 

 
Can the developer set up a failsafe for the web controls such that they return to safe values if the network connection to the web service is lost?
Yes, if the web service connection failed, the LabVIEW Web UI Builder developer can programmatially force the controls go back to a default state.
 

Are the NI IMAQ Vision controls supported?
NI IMAQ module is not currently supported, but there is an image control that can work with JPEGs and a media viewer control that can work with WMV files
 

Is the image control the same as the LabVIEW picture control?
No, it is not the same picture control as in LabVIEW. It is a new control called Image control which can display JPEGs, BMPs and GIF files.
 

Is a table control supported?
There is not a table control currently. A listbox or an array of strings would be the closest solution.