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Questions re: Licensing & Feature Availability of the DSC module

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Hello,

 

I transferred a project to another development PC. When I opened it, some of my network shared variables (NSV's) were flagged with Feature Errors: "Initial Value: Not licensed or cannot be edited outside of LabVIEW." I found out that it's because I didn't install the DSC Module on the newer machine; removing the "initial value" feature made the error message disappear.

 

That error itself wasn't a big deal, but it got me thinking and investigating. http://www.ni.com/white-paper/4679/en says:

 

If you want to use the features of the LabVIEW DSC Module, you must host the shared variables on Windows. The LabVIEW DSC Module adds the following functionality to network-published shared variables:

· Historical logging to NI Citadel database.

· Networked alarms and alarm logging.

· Scaling.

· User-based security.

· Initial value.

· The ability to create custom I/O servers.

· Integration of the LabVIEW event structure with the shared variable.

· LabVIEW VIs to programmatically control all aspects of shared variables and the shared variable engine.

 

Question 1

I did not realize that the Initial Value feature was part of the DSC Module. If I use it in a project, does that mean that my customer would need to buy a DSC runtime license? (I'm not using any other DSC feature)

 

Question 2

In my project, the NSV's in question were hosted on a cRIO target, yet my prototype (which had Initial Value enabled) ran happily without issues. This contradicts the documentation above which says "you must host the shared variables on Windows". Is this expected?

 

Question 3

I created a new NSV on my new machine (which doesn't have DSC installed). I saw the "Scaling" option. Is Scaling part of the DSC module or not?

 

Question 4

Initial Value and Scaling are generic features, unrelated to data logging/supervisory control. Why are they in the DSC Module? Should they not be in the base SV Engine?

Certified LabVIEW Developer
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Solution
Accepted by topic author JKSH

Hi,

 

1. Yes, any build that uses DSC features require a runtime license.

2. That's a recommendation for more reliable operations.

3. No, it is a native LabVIEW capability. The DSC modules simply adds more features regarding communication to protocols, alarming, etc

4. Initial value, Yes. Scaling, no. I believe is for easy access. Old school method is the one shown in here at the section "Initialize Your Shared Variables".

 

For more information about DSC visit this page.

 

Alejandro C. | National Instruments
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