Functions that call functions from external software

[kokokoko1212]

Is there a way to call the function of LabVIEW with a function using external software?

If there is a way to call it with a function, is there something like a list?

Also, please let me know if there is an article with such content on the site.

[rolfk · Accepted solution]

So you want to call a LabVIEW function from a different environment? What exactly and on what platform?

For Windows the still most common variant for that is to actually use the LabVIEW Automation interface to VI Server. By opening an ActiveX object to the LabVIEW Automation Server in your other software you do have a limited access to some of the VI server methods to load and also execute LabVIEW VIs.

If you want to do something else or not just for Windows, then the only publically sanctioned way I can currently think of is to create a LabVIEW library that uses the native VI server functionality and then turn that library into a shared library or DLL and call that from your other enviroment. I'm not aware of anyone having done that successfully but there have been requests for that here in the past and attempts for it. CORRECTION: the LabVIEW CLI basically uses that technique in order to allow its command line interface to LabVIEW for Continous Integration support.

NI also has a C calling interface that they use in some of their products internally. But they haven't documented that anywhere and I know for a fact that while there are some who would like to know about this, there would be very few who would actually be able to use it. The drawback of documenting something like this is that they can never change it anymore after its documented. Currently the only people that get pissed of when a LabVIEW developer would change that interface are NI internal customers, but once such an interface is officially documented there could be many others who might get affected. Because of that the incentive to document it is totally non existent