NI Package Manager (NIPM)

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NIPM or No NIPM, that is the question (Hamlet)

I have a LabVIEW application that I recently converted to LabVIEW 2020 (originally in LV2015).

 

If I include the LabVIEW runtime when building the installer (additional installers), NIPM is of course not included. All installs fine on a completely clean computer that has never seen any NI software.

 

The problem occurs if I now try to uninstall. There are two entries in the app panel of Windows 10, one for my application and one for "National Instruments Software". My app uninstalls fine but if I now also try to uninstall the runtime and click on "National Instruments Software" it tells me to launch NIPM instead, which is of course nowhere to be found. This is annoying and I am sure will be confusing to my users! They are sent on a Snipe hunt!

 

NoNIPackage.png

 

I have no choice than to press OK at the above dialog, at which point I get the old NI installer listing the LabVIEW 2020 as only items. I can uninstall all and everything is fine.

 

Where can I get a LabVIEW 2020 runtime installer that does not use NIPM and does not ask for NIPM when trying to uninstall??

 

Thanks!

 

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I am pretty sure all NI Software is now using NIPM and that NIPM is the only supported way going forward with it. Even the offline installers will install NIPM before they install the software.

Also, once NIPM is installed, it will be used instead of the older NIUninstaller for older NI software.

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Bill Eisenhower
Certified LabVIEW & TestStand Developer
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@CL_eisenwr wrote:

I am pretty sure all NI Software is now using NIPM and that NIPM is the only supported way going forward with it. Even the offline installers will install NIPM before they install the software.

Also, once NIPM is installed, it will be used instead of the older NIUninstaller for older NI software.


My experiment proved that NIPM is nowhere to be found in my given scenario. (all LabVIEW 2020). NIPM definitely did not get installed (and it is not even listed as available additional installers).

 

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@altenbach
Just to clarify, NIPM has never been installed on the PC in question? I have seen cases where people have uninstalled, NIPM but the PC still believes it is present due to some MSIs not being fully uninstalled.

__________________________________
Bill Eisenhower
Certified LabVIEW & TestStand Developer
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I might have benchmarked a LV2015 (pre-NIPM) executable long ago but I don't think I ever had NIPM. I'll probably built a clean VM for more testing to be sure)

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Hi altenbach,

 

Just to confirm, from LabVIEW 2020 you are selecting the Build Specifications->New->Installer option, right? Not the Build Specifications->New->Package option, right?

 

And the machine that you're running the Installer that you built on is a clean machine (or at least doesn't have any other NI software on it). Is that correct?

 

Thanks.

 

Aaron Pena

Productization Lead, Package and License Management

National Instruments

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Yes, a regular installer, not a package.

 

Under additional installers, I only select the 2020 runtime. I actually leave out most of the extra runtime stuff. (My program does pure computations, nothing else!)

 

The installed program seems to run fine with only this selection (and I don't even know if I need the MKL).

 

altenbach_0-1595889007349.png

 

(I was now playing around with packages (different thread) and it seems that in NIPM, I cannot leave any of these bits and pieces out. Even after, it won't allow me to e.g. surgically uninstall Logos (no, I don't use network shared variables!) because NIPM always wants to drag the entire runtime with it.. 😞

The dependencies are way too rigid!

 

Why can't I install a lean runtime with NIPM, containing none of the unchecked items above?

 

I am currently creating a VM to do more testing, but it's taking awhile to get ready with all the windows updates. ;))

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OK, if I do it on an absolutely clean (VM) machine, it does not complain about the missing NIPM, but just fires up the old NI installer tool with the 2020 run time listed as only item.

 

The other machine must have had an old version of NIPM installed at one time, but it definitely was not in the start menu or windows app listing.

 

Some casual testing shows that all I need is the runtime and MKL2020 and everything works fine. A pretty lean installer. Good!

 

Of course there is no telling what would happen if I now install NIPM, which will probably insists that some runtime dependencies are missing. We'll see....

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Since I do not want to include the runtime engine with all my apps, but also don't want my users to install the runtime via NIPM (currently only available as gigantic monolithic package from NI!), I create a tiny project and create an installer that does not contain any VIs, but only includes the sub-selection of the runtime engine as defined under additional installers. While the installer builder complains that I did not select an app or webvi, I can actually just ignore that complaint (I always thought that it was required to have an app!) and build an installer that only contains my special " 2020 runtime lite" (Only runtime and MKL2020).

 

This way I can tell my users to install my apps, but also install my personalize "runtime lite" once.

 

This "lite" runtime is only about 120MB zipped and does not install NIPM. I think I am happy with this. 😄

 

I'll do some more testing on a clean VI to make sure everything works well.

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