Building an executable

[smercurio_fc]

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@LarsUlrich wrote:

So I think I have stumbled across the cause of the problem (though I am still unsure of the solution).

In the Measurement and Automation explorer I can see and communicate with my intruments, however when the program runs and the user needs to input GPIB information into the front panel, the devices are missing.  The tech who this program was written for and who was running it was manually typing in the addresses, and labview must not be seeing the devices. 

As I said, the VISA functions are installed and those are what the drivers use, and the devices do appear and I can communicate with them using measurement and automation explorer.  (And clicking the "refresh" option shown does not fix the problem.)

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MAX does not use VISA to communicate with instruments. So, just because they show up in the list for MAX, that doesn't mean they will show up in a VISA resource control. What you are seeing is an unfortunately common problem. There appears to be no root cause, but usually uninstalling NI-VISA and reinstalling it may fix the problem with instruments not appearing in the VISA resource control.

I'm just curious as to what the tech was typing in. Did they know the format to be "GPIB::<address>::INSTR", or were they simply typing the numerical address? You may wish to consider creating aliases to make it easier for the techs to select an instrument, or have your program use VISA Find Resource to get the list of VISA Resources and translate this to friendly names and provide your own menu ring showing the friendly names.

[LarsUlrich]

Thats what I was worried about, I'll have him reinstall it on his computer and hopefully that will fix it.

The tech did know the correct format for the gpib address, when I programmed it I used different equipment (same make/model just different physical machines) and it defaulted to the address I was using, so he would just take the "28" out of the old address and replace it with what he knew his to be.

[LarsUlrich]

Also, I am a little confused about something else...

Though the computer I was trying to install this application to already had labview installed, the visa functions must be installed wrong and that's why they don't work.  Fine.

However, I was under the impression that you create the executable file so that you can run it on a machine that doesn't have labview.  We have a bunch of computers floating around the office that I would like to be able to use to control instruments, but the vast majority don't (and shouldn't have to) have labview.  Now obviously (I found out through my issues in this thread) if I use the visa functions, the visa functions have to be installed on that computer.  What else to I have to make sure is installed in order to run my programs if the computer I am installing it to does not have labview?

[smercurio_fc]

An executable that you create with the Application Builder cannot run on its own. It requires the LabVIEW Run-Time Engine. Just like an executable that you build in, say, Visual C# cannot run on its own. The target machine requires .NET. If your application uses drivers, then the drivers need to be installed on the target machine. The easiest way to do this is to create an installer. This allows you to include the required components. The process of creating an installer is explained in the LabVIEW Help.