Problem loading TDMS files

[Joshua.Heitsch]

First off, I'm not sure if this post should be in the DIAdem board or Measurement Studio.NET, but the symptoms are noticed from within DIAdem.

I have a Measurement Studio.NET (VB-based) program that is used to stream data to .TDMS files as they are read from a USB-6218 device.  Data is collected on 7 AI channels, each read at 1kS/s and saved to the TDMS file 100 at a time.  No time/date channel exists, since each sample is 1 ms and system time is irrelevant. Each channel usually contains ~170,000 data points.

That said, these files load perfectly fine into DIAdem 11.1 on the computer used to collect the data - simply by dragging each channel one at a time from the Data Portal to the View (2D Axis System) screen.  However, when any of these files (there are literally thousands of them collected to date) are opened in the exact same version of DIAdem on other systems, each channel shows up as only having a length of 100 samples (as opposed to ~170,000 which is correctly read on the other computer).  Comparison has been done using the exact same version of a file from a network drive, and tested on 3 additional computers with the same result.  I'm not sure if it is coincidence that it reads each channel length to be equal to what data is written to the file at or not, but I've even tried to delete _index files and allow them to recreate. 

1. Is there possibly an option to set somewhere within DIAdem?  I have tried to match all settings best as I can, but may be missing something.  
2. Is there additional software required to properly "convert" the TDMS file to properly display within DIAdem since there is no time channel? The reason I ask this is because the system that was used to collect the data (and debug the TDMS writing/reading) has quite a number of programs installed that may somehow interact with DIAdem and/or the TDMS files (LabVIEW, Measurement Studio, DAQmx drivers, MAX, TestStand, VISA, Excel TDM Importer, etc.)  

It is critical that these files be opened on other systems, and quite frankly I am at a loss without trying to install additional software to see if the behavior changes.  Any help would be greatly appreciated!

[Joshua.Heitsch]

SUCCESS!

Turns out that the computer used to write the TDMS files had tdms.dll version 2.2.1546.609 installed, whereas the others had version 2.0.1287.649.  When I copied the later version to the C:\Program Files\National Instruments\Shared|TDMS folder, DIAdem now properly displays the full file!

Sorry for the post - hopefully the info could be useful for others!

[YongqingYe]

Hi Joshua,

I'm working on TDMS in NI R&D. Thank you for your post. I'm still a little bit curious:

1. You mentiond the machine on which it had some problems loading the tdms file also installed DIAdem 2011, right? If so, I'm really curious why it still has the version of 2.0.1287.649 for tdms.dll installed, could you please confirm and do you have the idea of the reason?
2. More curious, why the file only display the first 100 samples with the old version, is that convenient for you to send me the file and let me try to reproduce the problem?

Thank you again!

Yongqing Ye

NI R&D

[Joshua.Heitsch]

All computers involved had only DIAdem 11.1 installed.  I do have a licence for DIAdem 2011, but it has not been installed in an effort to avoid any potential compatibility issues with other systems within my company. 

At any rate, I see no problem sending the file.  It is ~2MB, but I would rather not post it to the public forum.  How do you prefer I send it?

[Brad_Turpin]

Hi Joshua,

You can post the TDMS file to our incoming ftp site:

ftp.ni.com/incoming

Note that this works best via drag&drop using WINDOWS Explorer, not Internet Explorer.

Brad Turpin

DIAdem Product Support Engineer

National Instruments