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C# User Interface 4.0/4.1/4.2/2012/2016/20XX Compilation Issues

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Hi,

 

I have a situation (pretty frustrating) in which we have a client that has many flavors of teststand engine and we have only the latest version (2016).

 

Our client is responsible of providing the test sequences for their product but we are responsible of the traceability process around it so we must create the user interface with our business code to wrap the test sequence but we do not alterate their sequences, only controlling is the execution can go and at the end of the execution we must communicate the result back to our traceability system which works pretty well.

 

The problem is the following : 

As far as my knowledge of version compatibility is, if I need to compile our business code into a 2012 UI with only teststand 2016 installed, I won't be able to do it until I install 2012 and make it active with the version selector.  This is frustrating because I only need to recompile the C# side of the code and not the active X controls and without the license I'm unable to support our client unless I install a trial version of 2012.  I tried to just add references to the API dll of that versions (2012) which can be found on our client's machine but it is not sufficient, it seems to be pointing to engine 2016 as the 2012 is not installed and creates exception when launched on the client's machine.  

 

Question:

Is there anything I'm missing (I hope so) to avoid creating many UI interface for each version of teststand (same UI... ) ?

If not, what are my options if I have 2016 and I want to support the 2012 version or even worse, version 4.2 ? 

Should I have a UI for every version I want to support ?

 

Thanks 

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Solution
Accepted by topic author ebonneau9

Hi ebonneau9,

 

TestStand doesn't support version independent User Interfaces.  You can get close to replicating this by using the UI from the oldest version of TestStand you are working on, then using that UI in the newer versions.  This is less of an issue if the oldest version you had was 2012, but going all the way back to TestStand 4 might be problematic.

 

So, to solve this problem:

1) create your UI in TestStand 4

2) limit the applications in higher versions to the limitations of this UI

3) use this UI for future versions

 

We do not recommend this path, and would recommend standardizing your code base to a newer version - at least the 2012 version - and working forward with that UI.

Tyler O.
Applications Engineer
National Instruments
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Hi tobriant,

 

Thank you for your solution.

One question comes to my mind about this proposal :

When you are saying "using that UI in the newer versions", does that means that I need to have a licence of that new version ($$$$$) to succeed in compiling with the new activeX controls knowing that our business code has not changed at all ?

 

Maybe the free trial could do the job at this point for newer version...

What do you think?

 

By the way, I will accept your last answer as the solution but I would still like to get your advice about this question.

Thanks,

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