LabVIEW IDE Overhaul

[JackDunaway]

1. Allow for "Tabbed Browsing" of VI's to better manage windows.

2. Allow for the BD to be open independent of the FP.

3. Allow dockable palettes... dock to either the edge of the screen, or to the top bar (pictured below) of LabVIEW.

4. As a bonus, consider being able to open PDF's, txt's, and html's in tabs also for Help and documentation.

5. Finally, allow the project tree to be docked into the IDE.

Please, add your own IDE upgrade ideas in this discussion - illustrations will be especially helpful here. If it's a major enough idea, create a new idea!

[AristosQueue (NI)]

Anyone who likes this idea really should be in the Austin Convention Center, Wednesday (not Tuesday) at 8am, August 5, 2009... I'm not saying you'll see this... I'm just saying you should see something...

[altenbach]

I don't like the idea, but I'll be there anyway. 😄

[Intaris]

So what was the topic of the presentation?

Anyone?

[joshuatree]

why do you have to have a tab for each FP and BD?  as i only work on one then the other, let one tab represent both.  the one that isn't being actively worked on can be "thumbnailed" somewhere within the tab...  anchor it to the top right. or right click the tab and select from a context.

if you want to work "multi-threaded" with multiple vi's like altenbach says, just drag the tab out like chrome does....  woohoo... wouldn't that be awesome!! 

[Daklu]

I used to be a big supporter of an MDI dev environment.  Not anymore.  MDI's don't span multiple monitors very well except under specific circumstances.  (Identical monitors, same height above the desk, small bevels, etc.)  Converting to an MDI effectively limits my working space to a single monitor.  There are many improvements I'd like to see in the dev environment but in the era of multimonitor computers I don't think MDI is the way to go.

[rolfk]

I would not want MDI in any way. Visual Studio has been brought up and I find the fact that I have to confine all source files to the Visual Studio project workspace a limitation in my work.

One thing I think could be very helpful is to add an extra view to the project window that shows a list of all open LabVIEW windows (FP and BD) for that project. If the Windows taskbar could then be limited to only show buttons for the open projects, this would help with the taskbar navigation although that taskbar is in fact a major Windows usability problem anyhow.

Message Edited by rolfk on 08-13-2009 01:50 AM

[rolfk]

Double post

Message Edited by rolfk on 08-13-2009 01:48 AM

[reniam]

I like this idea - kind of. I would prefer to have just the project explorer window dockable on the side of the monitor and stayed on the top.  It would be nice if the project explorer window had a list of open VI's that could be single clicked to bring one to the top.

mecheleceng is correct that more and more applications are going to a tabbed format. Most IDE's are this way. OrCAD Capture just went to tabs.

[reniam]

Great idea. I've wondered why they haven't put this in. Most IDE's are like this. OrCAD Capture 16.2 just added tabbing for the schematics and a docked project heirarchy. It's a huge improvement. Worrying about the number of tabs open shouldn't be a worry since you'll end up keeping open only the pertinant VI's. I have the opposite problem now. I often have VI's open because they get buried in the task bar.

At the very least the project explorer window should be dockable to the side of the monitor. Maybe a list of open VI's that can be single clicked to the top.

[rolfk]

Message Edited by rolfk on 03-15-2010 08:48 AM