BreakPoint
Carnac the Magnificient - sarcastic answers to serious questions/comments
@crossrulz wrote:
No middle button on my mouse. But Ctrl+Click works just as well!
The middle click for me also brings up QuickDrop in LabVIEW, back and forward move to the next and previous cases, and I have two other buttons on my mouse for CTRL+E, and CTRL+A.
...Filthy casual.
@Hooovahh wrote:
The middle click for me also brings up QuickDrop in LabVIEW, back and forward move to the next and previous cases, and I have two other buttons on my mouse for CTRL+E, and CTRL+A.
...Filthy casual.
Only two extra buttons Hooovahh?
Kudos for the use of Filthy Casual though.
I mostly use a (small) Wacom tablet. Mostly to prevent RSI, I trained to operate a (right handed) mouse with left and right, and the Wacom pen with left and right...
Those Wacom's are a bit expensive, but I bought mine in 2001, and it's still going strong. It's remarkably resistant to large coffee spills... You do need a few weeks to get used to them. There's no scroll wheel, that's the only thing I really miss, because I can't loop through cases (ctrl+wheel).
I also have a big (A4) Wacom for drawing, but it's terrible for LabVIEW.
Search LabVIEW like a graph!
@Jacobson-ni wrote:
Only two extra buttons Hooovahh?.
I've tried one of those extra crazy button mouses and didn't really like it. It had a joystick on the thumb that moved in 4 directions and could be pushed in. The wheel was then another 4 direction stick with a button below it. The software it came with for configuring it was just garbage and never worked the way I wanted. The mouse I use now isn't so crazy that a normal person can't walk up and start using it. My keyboard on the other hand confuses everyone.
thoult wrote:Relying on its shortcuts becomes a pain in the backside when moving to systems where it's not physically connected, however :s
I have the same with custom quick drop functions. If they're not build in, I don't bother anymore. Too difficult when they are not there...
I'm so fixed in my ways that I have auto tool select turned off. Drives me crazy when I am on one of my associates computers trying to help them, they all, as new users, started out with auto tool select, but after 20+ years of tabbing or space-barring to get the tool I want ... As far as mouse, I got an actual callous on one project from using the mouse pad on my laptop when I didn't have room for a mouse where I was working (it really was a laptop!).
So, as a relatively new LabVIEW developer, why is autotool bad? What do you get from not having it?
I'm guessing some more leeway with mouse positioning trying to get the action you want (sometimes the branching tool comes up when you want to move etc) but is that really worth it?
How do you switch tools otherwise? Shift + Right click all the time?
Perhaps we're off topic here, but I do want to know!
Auto tool is not "bad" but I had something like 10 years of 'muscle memory' programmed into my "operating system", so when I have auto tool on I end up trying to go to another tool by tabbing or hitting the space bar (when auto tool has been turned off) and it takes me a moment, and jars me out of the thought thread, when I remember "it" is selecting the tool. It doesn't always know what I want. Conversely, for those used to auto-tool, it would break their thread if they had to consciously manually select the tool, something that I do at a more autonomic level. In fact, at times I might go through the tools selections a couple of times, unconsciously, while deciding what I am doing next on the diagram, sort of NO-OP loop (for those who remember machine language programming). With 25 years of almost continuous working in the evolving LabVIEW environment I have some internal habits that still don't interfere with my work. I do remember, when auto tool select first came out, my local NI rep suggested that I just sit on my left hand while programming to break the habit, but since I don't see, for me, a speed increase with using auto-tool ...
