system exec.vi labview application

[jachy25]

Hi everyone,

I'm having a problem with system exec.vi. I simply want to open another program using labview. This works whenever I try to access it using the VI. However, when I turn the VI into an executable, the system exec.vi doesn't do anything. I'm running a windows xp machine. I have tried it with a windows 7 machine and still nothing. any help would be appreciated. Thanks.

[nathand]

Are you using a relative path to the EXE? If so, LabVIEW may report a different path when a VI is compiled into an executable, so a path relative to a VI's path may be wrong.

[jachy25]

Hey nathand,

I'm not really sure what you mean. The only thing I have connected to the system exec VI is the path to the program. It's also installed at the same place in both the windows 7 machine and the windows xp machine.

[crossrulz · Accepted solution]

Did you put the "cmd /c" before the program to run?

[jachy25]

crossrulz,

Thank you! That did the trick. Is there any way to close the cmd right after it launches the program?

[crossrulz]

There are options on the SystemExec.vi for that. You should really read the hep file on it.

[nathand]

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@jachy25 wrote:

Hey nathand,

I'm not really sure what you mean. The only thing I have connected to the system exec VI is the path to the program. It's also installed at the same place in both the windows 7 machine and the windows xp machine.

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Obviously this wasn't the issue, but to clarify: a relative path means you're providing a path relative to some other item. For example, if you were generating the path to the EXE by using the "Current VI's Path" function and then using Strip Path/Build Path, that would be a relative path. The "Current VI's Path" function may return a different path inside an executable than in the development environment, so that could cause the issue you describe.

If you're referencing the external program with an absolute path (ie "C:\Program Files\Vendor\program.exe") then this isn't an issue, of course.

[jachy25]

Thanks for the help and great explanations guys 🙂

[Riaan1]

Hi,

I'm not quite sure what you mean - will you mind explaining in a bit more detail. I have the same problem.

[nathand]

Which part isn't clear? The accepted solution says to prepend "cmd /c " to the command line string input to System Exec. For example if you wanted to execute notepad.exe, the command line would be "cmd /c notepad.exe".