multiple instances of an exe (and of a VI)

[Graziano]

Hi all,
   I need to run an exe I created with application builder, more than one time.  I have to run two separate instances of this exe.

   More, I'm still interested in calling a subVI more than once from a top level VI, and the two instances of the subVI should run in parallel, with different inputs.

   is there some reference for this?  Thanks everybody!

graziano

[GerdW]

Hi graziano,

for your second point:
for running a vi twice (or more) in parallel you have to set it to reentrant in it's execution options...

[JeffOverton]

Reentrancy is probably your best bet for calling a SubVI several times with unique data space. I don't know about the executable part.

Message Edited by JeffOverton on 03-10-2008 12:02 PM

[Graziano]

Hi All!
   Thanks for interesting in my problem!

   Reentrancy is a good solution, i'll use it to build an Action Engine, which will be the core manipulator of a unique data space.  But the VIs I'd call twice from the main VI consists of an endless while loop....

    Apart from this, the main issue is running an exe twice (it's a different project than above!), I can do that simply replicating .exe, but I wondered if there's a smarter way....

graziano

[GerdW]

Hi Graziano,

be careful: the action engine should be (IMHO) never be set to reentrant as it should store your data safely!!!

For your exe:
I don't think (I don't know for sure) there's a better (aka simpler) way to start the exe more than once than simply copy&rename it as often as needed. I think the RunTimeEngine will separate the different exe's by their name...

[Graziano]

Sorry!
   You're absolutely right, I always mistake reentrant with non reentrant.  It is reentrant VI that creates a separate data space! Of course I have to force action engine to have one single instance!

graziano

[Graziano]

...the simplest way to explain my task: actually, the 2 calls to the same subVI should create two different thread, vecause they're parallel loops.  Is this possible, in a more elegant way  than renaming subVI and calling two different names?

graziano

[Derek Price]

You can also add these two lines to your program's generated INI file:

[ApplicationName]
allowmultipleinstances = TRUE

Good Luck!

[Ben]

Gerd wrote "be careful: the action engine should be (IMHO) never be set to reentrant as it should store your data safely!!!"

AE can be used to do averaging of a signal. In that case, a reentrant AE can be coded once and used many times. I believe the NI PID toolkit is implemented using this approach.

Templates are very usefully when you want the same VI to run as multiple instances. LV creates a new instance each time you open a template, have allowed FP updates going back to the beginning of time and are available in the exe environment.

Ben

Message Edited by Ben on 03-10-2008 11:51 AM

[Graziano]

Hi!
   It works fine, thanks!  But this lead to some questions

   - Where do I find infos on editing application generated .ini files?

   - Isn't there a way to do this for an application build with "application builder"? Or should i tell user to manually edit .ini file?

   Really thanks again!

graziano

PS.: I spent some years in building embedded LV applications, so every time it comes to graphical interfaces or PC-based apps in general, I need help  ..... perhaps, sometimes I need help on FieldPoint too