LV8.2 attempts to build source distribution with relative paths and errors

[Jody]

We regularly create source distributions for clients at the end of a project so that they have a copy of all the code necessary including user.lib VIs and such. This worked very well under LV8.0 and would output an entire hierarchy to the the destination specified.

I am having issue accomplishing the same thing in LV8.2 . Essentially what it looks like is that LV8.0 used absolute paths when generating the hierarchy for a source build, but LV8.2 uses relative paths. In other words my main folders for the project end up under the "My Source Distribution" folder, but the user.lib end up four or five directories above that. I am attaching an image that should make things a little more clear.

I can work-around this problem by using the Save VI and perserve hierarchy function, but this means that the VI I save has to reference all the other VIs in the project.

Anyone have thoughts?

-J

[Rudi_N]

Jody:

Thank you very much for contacting National Instruments. I built a souce distribution and the application builder put all the generated files in the same folder. I understand that you noticed something different and I would appreciate if you could provide me with more information so that I can reproduce this issue on my end.

Regards,

Rudi N.

[Jody]

Rudi-

Not sure what else I can say about it. In LV8 I used to get a "C" folder and all the expected subfolders under whatever I set the target directory to. In 8.2 it seems to place files relative to where the actual project file is located. So my user.lib stuff ends up several directories above my target directory in a new National Instruments folder. I think the image I attached does a pretty good job of explaining the issue. What other information can I provide?

-J

[Rudi_N]

J:

Thanks for providing more clarification. I have looked at the application builder a little bit further and I realized that there is an option under the Distribution Settings page that allows you to specify whether or not you would like to preserve the hierarchy of your application or not (please see attachment). I created a source distribution with "Single Destination" selected and I was able to output all my files to one folder. Please let me know which option you have selected under the Distribution Settings page.

Thanks,

Rudi N.

Message Edited by Rudi N on 02-28-2007 05:19 PM

Message Edited by Rudi N on 02-28-2007 05:19 PM

[Jody]

I am using the "preserve hierarchy" option. A single folder is not useful for me since we have a lot of VIs and the organization is rather important. I am attaching several images to demonstrate the issue. Notice that the target in all these is the "My Source Distribution" folder. In the preview from LV8.0 everything goes into this directory. In the preview for LV8.2 things are placed relative to this directory -- the "National Instruments" directory is placed outside of the target directory. I am demonstrating with just the user.lib VI that I used, but the issue often occurs with other VIs when they are not in the same folder as the project file.

-J

[Jody]

And some more attachments - it limits me to three per post.

-J

[Rudi_N]

J:

I looked through the screenshots you sent me and tried to create a source distributions under LabVIEW 8.0 and 8.2. You will find below the screenshots of the folder hierachies. It is strange that things seem to be working just fine on my end. I will play around again with the application builder and let you know what I find.

Regards,

Rudi N.

[billings11]

I saw this too.  One day it was working like you said, with a drive letter folder and hierarchy underneath.  The next day it was putting things in weird spots, like one level higher up than the destination folder I was selecting.

Are you working off a mapped network drive?  I was thinkig it might be some problem with the mapping, like labview thinks the absolute path is a network path like "//Main/Sub/Sub" instead of mapped to a drive letter.  I saw this a couple times before, where in the load search window instead of searching my mapped O: drive it would say it was searching //files/O drive (the absolute network path).  If it got // at the beginning of the absolute path it couldn't create a folder for that name, so would it think it needs to go up a level in the directory structure or something instead?

Can anyone at NI comment if this sounds like it might be the problem?

[Donovan_B]

This was reported to R&D (# 43788G7U) and was fixed in LabVIEW 8.5.  Here is a link to the current evaluation software download for LabVIEW.

It appears that this is caused when you choose not to exclude files from vi.lib, user.lib, or instr.lib from the Additional Exclusions page in the Source Distribution Properties window.  I do not know if this occurs because of using networked mapped drives.