Display array contents & prompt user for process priority

[ATMA]

Hi, i need help developing an interface.

I have an array which contains a complete list of models available at my company. Now, i want to create an interface where the contents are displayed and user is able enter numbers to select the models he/she wants to run and the process priority.

eg: The array contains models A to Z. The user is able to select models D, A, G and B and instruct the program to process them at the same sequence.

How do i acheive this in Labview?

I'm very poor at designing interface, can someone point me to any literature and tutorials in developing frontpanel interface in Labview?

Thank you.

[LV_Pro]

I'm not entirely clear on what you art attempting to do. If you have an array of available tests you can display them in a listbox, and then have the selection order define the execution priority. The display in the list box can  be by feeding the test names from your arry into the listbox's property node.

As to guidance in developing a user interface, the are many schools of thought on UI design. For LabVIEW I personally like "LabVIEW GUI Essential Techniques" by David Ritter. He has a lot of interesting and informative "stuff" in his book.

[ATMA]

Thanks for replying LV. I'll try to explain what i'm trying to do...

I have an array with the list of products my company carry, around say 40 50 of them. I want to read all these product names from a tab-delimited text file, pass it into an array, and display them in the GUI to prompt user for further action. The GUI has to be able to allow users to enter numbers or maybe check box (processing priorities) beside their desired product names (since not all users would want to process all 50 models).

How do i implement this? especially the number input beside each model name part.

[TreyB_NI]

---

@vcteo wrote:
Thanks for replying LV. I'll try to explain what i'm trying to do...

I have an array with the list of products my company carry, around say 40 50 of them. I want to read all these product names from a tab-delimited text file, pass it into an array, and display them in the GUI to prompt user for further action. The GUI has to be able to allow users to enter numbers or maybe check box (processing priorities) beside their desired product names (since not all users would want to process all 50 models).

How do i implement this? especially the number input beside each model name part.

---

Let me see if I understand...You want to have a list of all of your products, and allow the user to click on a check mark next to each one, and have LabVIEW remember the order in which the user selected each check mark?


Trey B
Applications Engineering
National Instruments

[ATMA]

Well Trey B, it doesn't have to be a check mark, can be a numeric input, for eg:

This is the display for ALL the model names:
----------------------------------------------
| Model A            3
| Model B            2
| Model C
| Model D
|      :
| Model M            1
|      :
|      :
| Model Z            4

As you can see here, model A to Z is displayed nicely, and beside each model is a numeric box where the user can select the models to process. Here you can see the user decide to process model M, B, A and Z in that particular order. I know i can display the product array contents nicely with a list box, it's the numeric boxes beside each name that i'm having problem with.

[johnsold]

What happens if a user repeats a number?

----------------------------------------------
| Model A 3
| Model B 2
| Model C 2
| Model D 2
| :
| Model M 1
| :
| :
| Model Z 4

I modified your example to show B, C, and D all having the value 2.

Suppose the user checks off the Models in the order they should be tested and the display puts in a consecutive number rather than just displaying the checks or allowing the user to enter a number? This would have the simplicity for the user of the check box, while providing a priority dispaly and avoiding the entry problem of duplicate numbers. Editing the selection might be more of a problem.

Lynn

[Daniel_E]

Hey, I have done something similar to this in the past.  The way I did it was by using a listbox.  I had buttons that the user would select to tell me what to do and how to modify the listbox contents.  For example, in your case, I would have an Edit button.  When the user selects the Model and hits Edit, I would pop up a screen asking him which process he would like to assign to the model.  Then I would check for errors and if none existed, I would update the listbox contents with the new information.

Let me know if this helps or if I should provide more explantation.

Thanks!

Dan

[ATMA]

Thanks Dan. Well, it's sort of similar to what you did but instead of selecting Model A, then process, i want to user to be able to select the models he/she want to process at the start before all the processing starts.

The reason is because the processing of each model takes a LONG time, thus it wouldn't make sense for the user to select model A, process, wait, then select the next model.

[Daniel_E]

I agree!  What I was referring to was a setup VI.  Then, based on what the user sets up, you could pass out the models to be processed to the main VI.

Hope this helps!

Dan

[ATMA]

Thanks, i'll play around with it and see how it goes.