How sevear are the disadvantages of running a test computer "Off-Line"?

[Bernard42]

PROBLEM:   Continual system and antivirus software updates cause conflicts and crashes with the LabView test software.

SOLUTION:  Take the test system off-line.  Permanently disconnect the internet capability and the networking capability.  This will keep the system software stable and eliminate this persistent source of software problems. [This will also protect the computer from virus attacks and keep the computer from being a source of virus infection.]

QUESTION:  Will the loss of the NI online help, downloading and etc, be a serious detriment to ongoing test operations?   Boss wants to know the disadvantages of "off-line" operation.

[Enrique]

It is not a major issue, unless your application relies on the Internet to function correctly. Obviously, if your application need to communicate with other computers or servers to perform certain tasks (store and retrieve data, remote operation, etc.) your application will be impacted. Otherwise, it is just a stand-alone computer.

Which makes me always wonder (and sorry for taking this a little off-topic): Why Windows assumes... wait, that's wrong... take for granted that your computer is connected to the Internet? It is really annoying to see "Automatic updates is turned off. Click this balloon to fix this problem" everytime on a computer that is not connected to anything.

[tst]

I personally prefer that all the systems I deploy are on computers which are not connected to the internet. It seems that your case is different, however, since our applications are mostly control applications and often come with a new dedicated computer and do not require a connection to the internet (no LV installed, the user doesn't even care how we wrote the application).

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@Enrique wrote:

Which makes me always wonder (and sorry for taking this a little off-topic): Why Windows assumes... wait, that's wrong... take for granted that your computer is connected to the Internet? It is really annoying to see "Automatic updates is turned off. Click this balloon to fix this problem" everytime on a computer that is not connected to anything.

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Windows assumes that because 8X-9X% of Windows computers probably are connected to the internet and or used by people who don't know much about computers.

You can disable this if you go into the security center and click the "link" called "Change the way Security Center alerts me".

The rant here should actually be about using links instead of buttons or menus. This is something I personally don't like and I've seen NI using it as well (for instance, in the Defer Decision dialog). In this case, the left pane (resources) has two links for getting updates (makes sense), two links for getting help (also makes sense) and one link for changing this.

I understand why the first 4 links are displayed as links and as a "power user" I simply ignore them. Since I ignore them I automatically ignore the last link as well and so I miss the options for disabling the dialogs. Conspiracy theorists will probably say that MS did this on purpose to annoy them or something.