Dialog control for selecting remote computers??

[TommyB]

Does anyone know of a way to select a remote computer form a dialog prompt
similar to the File/Directory Dialog VI? The File Dialog Prompt VI only
provides paths or file names as an output. I am trying to allow the user to
obtain the remote computer's name so that I can then create a TCP/IP or UDP
connection to an application that may be running on the remote computer.

Thanks in advance,
Tom

[chutla]

You can do this in windows if you MAP the remote computer drive to a drive letter. Then you can simply put your directory(s) in a ring selector, or other type of menu.

Eric

[TommyB]

Eric:
Thanks but mapping network computers to local drive letters isn't exactly
the thing that I want my users to do. They won't even understand the
concept and by the time it's explained I may as well go out and do all of
the connections every day myself.
Any other ideas out there? There must be an easy way to do this?
-Tom

"chutla" wrote in message
news:506500000005000000101C0100-1042324653000@exchange.ni.com...
> You can do this in windows if you MAP the remote computer drive to a
> drive letter. Then you can simply put your directory(s) in a ring
> selector, or other type of menu.
>
> Eric

[chutla]

Ahh...yes, the user dilemma:

Well, the ideal option is probably to use Datasocket...you may have to do some major rewriting of your vi to accommodate this. If done right, Datasocket front panels can be totally transparent to the user. You might look at the Datasocket example...remote weather....and see how different remote sites are selected. I'm assuming you only need to access Labview functions and files on the remote computers.

Another option is to set up ftp servers on the remote computers, if it's not too monumental a task. Then you can use the Labview TCP communication functions to accss them....which can also be invisible to the user, other than an address which can be aliased to a computer name.
My own preference is to do
as much as possible with Datasocket...it's a very efficient system.

Eric