Make updating the GUI a priority in a near-term LabVIEW release

[Mads]

Not so much an idea, as a wish/plead/rant:

Please make the next version of LabVIEW a major update of the features we have available to create user interfaces.

2011 was the "improved stability" version. 2014 should be the year it became simple and fun to create user interfaces that blow everyone's socks off. I'm not even talking about fancy stuff, just get the basics right!  Fix the graph indicators, and provide better front panel scaling options - and that alone will make 2014 the best update ever(!).

I started writing a list of all the things I find bad with the graph/charts for example, and found out that it would be better to just do a search here on the idea exchange to see how many ideas mention graphs alone. 2390 ideas! (yes, I have not gone through them all to filter out the ones that do not actually request changes to the graphs, but most of them do, directly or indirectly...). My own little list started like this, in random order:

Graphs and charts

1. You cannot stack plots in any of the graph indicators, only in charts
2. Number of plots stacked cannot be varied at run-time
3. Annotation properties are only partially available programmatically
4. Auto-scaling cannot be restricted to one way-only, it's behaviour cannot be configured in any way
5. Legends, palettes and tools do not fit together to form an organized user interface, nor are they possible to detach from eachother to get more flexible designs/scaling for ecxample...
6. XY graphs become sluggish and almost unusable with large data sets, where alternatives written in other languages have no performance issues
7. Plot colors could automatically adjust to the chosen background color - suggesting unique colors for the added plots that provide the best possible
visibility.

8. Graphs on e.g. Google and Yahoo have tonnes of cool features like animated zooming, thumbnail graphs, highlighting of the plot you hover the mouse over etc. which provide a very interactive feeling, you can achieve some of this in LV as well, but it could/should be possible with little or no programming

9. To get charts to accept data with variable sample rate (delta X) is possible, but cumbersome and an almost hidden feature...

Mixed signal
1. You cannot set the group names programmatically
2. The number of plot areas is not configurable at run-time
3. You cannot assign plots to a given group programmatically
4. You cannot show the visibility checkbox of each plot etc.

And then you have the additional 2000 ideas...;-)

As for front panel scaling there are not that many ideas (naturally), but the impact/value of them would change every LabVIEW programmer's life significantly. We can stop spending so much time finding ways around limitations in LV, and start focusing on the actual goal of our applications.

Would that not make everyone's day?

[AristosQueue (NI)]

Please note that "near term" does not mean LV 2016. That is already in beta. This is "in dev".

[X.]

@Mads: Exciting or scary?

[Mads]

@X: A bit of both  

I guess we'll just have to cross our fingers and toes the next 1,5 year (or more).

[Darren]

Available in LabVIEW NXG 1.0. The NXG editor has been redesigned and modernized. Any specific usability or design suggestions for NXG should be submitted as new, separate idea exchange entries.

[Mads]

I would rather say the idea has been turned down for "LabVIEW". There is a completely new and different product called NXG with an interface other than that of LabVIEW yes, but it is not able to replace LabVIEW for application development for many years to come. It's more like a more interactive NI MAX, with some G coding capabilitites thrown in. If you have a look at the numbered items mentioned in the idea there are not many you can tick off either. Heck, we even seem to have to fight a new fight to get an icon that differentiates between 1.0 and 2.0 😮

It's a terrible disappointment, but what's done is done.

[carlos_camargo]

This is bogus.  It was not completed at all.  Be honest and state that it was turned down.  Why get our hopes up?

[AristosQueue (NI)]

Darren and I and the others who manage the Idea Exchange did not feel that Declined was the right answer because LabVIEW NXG does have a massive improvement to the UI, and, indeed, was created to solve the UI problems of LabVIEW 20xx. G programming needed to be rethought from the ground up to fix some of the deep problems that LabVIEW 20xx has. With NXG, there is a solution for G programmers who want a better UI. That solution has some (severe) limitations at this time, but those have been decreasing. Whether it will ever hit the point where it can be adopted by the majority of LabVIEW users is an open question. It didn't seem like the Idea Exchange was the right place to be making that evaluation. Because NI is aware of the LV UI limitations and has acted to provide a replacement, this idea is, in our opinion, complete, even if the result isn't quite what you envisioned.

My hope is that this is correctly marked as Complete. If LabVIEW NXG fails to take over the marketplace in the next 5 years, we might have to revisit this.

[carlos_camargo]

AristosQueue, with all due respect to you and Darren, I completely disagree.  This is the LabVIEW (Proper) Idea Exchange, not the LabVIEW NGX Idea Exchange.  It would be, again, much more honest to admit that you've decided to punt and ask people to go to NGX if they want software that includes those fixes.  Its status needs to be "Rejected". 

This "Completed" status does nothing more than falsely inflate the "Completed" stats for LabVIEW improvements.

[AristosQueue (NI)]

Carlos: I understand there is room for disagreement. I'll explain our thinking a bit deeper. But even as I explain, let me assure you: I get why you're objecting to our answer.

Darren and I (and NI overall) know that NXG is not the right tool for a large block of our users at this time. But NXG does work for many of our users already... for those users, it is G with a modern UI. NI sells both platforms bundled together -- anyone who has one has the other -- so any LabVIEW user does have LabVIEW NXG available for use. From that perspective, it's no different than many other tools that we ship as part of LabVIEW. LabVIEW NXG is intended to replace LabVIEW at some point (indeed, the plan is to simply drop the "NXG" label if/when the time comes).

> It would be, again, much more honest to admit that you've decided

> to punt and ask people to go to NGX if they want software that

> includes those fixes.

It is not a punt. It is the same as saying you need to upgrade to LabVIEW 2020 if you want interfaces. LabVIEW NXG is a future version of LabVIEW that has the UI improvements. It's also, unfortunately, a downgrade in some areas, at this time. But it keeps improving. At some point, it should cross the threshhold where it is LabVIEW. I do not work on the product, but I know many good engineers who do. I can't give a timeline, but I think this idea is correctly marked.

[drjdpowell]

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it is G with a modern UI

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I think the OP was talking about the Application UI's one can make with LabVIEW, rather than the UI of LabVIEW.  NXG is an all-new UI of LabVIEW, but I'm not aware of it having (yet?) any significant improvement in the UI's one can make with it.  It doesn't have better front-panel scaling options, for example (I'm not even sure it has any scaling option yet; no splitter bars or replacement for such).  As a User of LabVIEW, I do not present LabVIEW to my customers; I present applications written in LabVIEW.