An option to lock boolean text and label together

[altenbach]

As discussed here a long time ago, I typically hide the labels of controls inside radiobuttons. We want to show the boolean text, because it is clickable. The labels are just in the way and clutter things up, so they are typically hidden.

A radiobutton control acts like an enum, with the items names corresponding to the control labels inside the radiobutton control. This makes it difficult to add more radio items, because shift-dragging an existing control creates a duplicate with the old label name incremented.

I typically immediately change the boolean text to the new selection, but to change the label, I need to go to the properties page and update it from there.

In these scenarios (and maybe others), it would be nice to have an option to synchronize the label with the (OFF) boolean text: changing one will update the other and vice versa.

It could look as follows:

 

For the radiobutton controls, I would also recommend that this option be enabled and that the inner control labels are hidden by default.

[labview4steve]

Yes, I agree but not just booleans - This needs to be done with all labels and captions for all controls...

this wastes so much of my time.. this one change alone would save me hours...

I change virtually every caption I make to the same name as the label and vice versa...

in the few cases where I will change the caption then I make it it something simpler then I can simply untick this option to unlock it when I make it...

If we are copying a whole bunch then labview could prompt us if we want to keep all options and properties the same or revert to the default.. etc

[altenbach]

I don't see a good reason to do any of this for captions. By default, controls don't have captions, and if you show it for the first time, it will be the same as the label automatically. I have never encountered the need for captions to be the same as the label. Why would you need the caption at all if it only contains redundant information? Can you describe a use case?

I typically keep the label short and sweet for documentation on the diagram, and show the caption on the front panel with more detailed, user-friendly text in the rare cases where it is needed.

[fabric]

While I am equally bothered by the cumbersome workflow of adding items to radio controls, there's something about locking the label to the boolean "OFF" text that feels a bit dirty...

• As you hint, there may be multiple boolean text strings. Even though you specify using the "OFF" text, in most cases one of the radio options will be "ON". This may be confusing if the boolean "ON" text is changed and the label remains the same.
• I often prefer to give my labels very concise names (usually to save block diagram space), while boolean text is often more descriptive. Generally both names would be different for me in most cases.

That said, I would definitely support an improved interface to edit item labels (and/or captions, boolean text) in radio controls, especially without requiring the show>edit>hide workflow.

Possible alternative: Copy and paste new item>right-click>"Edit Label"...

[AristosQueue (NI)]

Boolean Text and Caption can both be changed programmatically while the VI is running, allowing for localization and dynamic content. Label, which is the name of the control, is locked at run time.

Would enabling this option block programmatic changes to the Caption or Boolean Text?

[labview4steve]

Altenbach, i thought your question would be obvious..
It's funny when people ask rhetorical question that they think has no answer, when in fact it has several... 😉

Anyway - here is just one an example where the caption needs to be the same as the label...
The label is what the programmer sees when he is coding the block diagram right?, and the caption or label is what the user sees??

so, if you are coding for multiple languages then you only need to change the caption (which will be the only one displayed as well) if you are not using the default language...
if you change to do a different language then the caption can be updated but the labels can be left alone and may still need to be visible in certain modes etc for diagnostics etc... this is a common time when the caption needs to be the same as the label , but while still having the need for a caption that you can change programatically.