Microchip

[dg_lbe]

I have a developer board that uses a Microchip PIC33 to talk to an IC.  The company developed a windows based application that can be used for experimenting with the device.  I would like to talk to the board using LabVIEW instead of their application.   What is needed?  Do I need a command set from the company?????

Thanks for taking the time to read the post.

[BTC_Admin]

Hardware vendors often provide drivers/libraries to programmatically control/communicate with their hardware that you can use in your own custom application. Check to see if you received (or if you can receive) such files from your vendor (such as .dll files), once you have that file try the following:

Functions pallette->Connectivity->Libraries & Executables->Call Library Function Node

You'll have to place that on your block diagram and double click to configure it first (select library file name, function call name, etc).  If you get that library file, you can talk to your developer board to talk to an IC from LabVIEW.

If that company provided you with command-line interface, you could also use:

Functions pallette->Connectivity->Libraries & Executables->System Exec.vi

which essentially gives you same interface as a (DOS) command prompt on windows where you could use command-line interface.

[dg_lbe]

Manufacture supplies an activex control which was used.

Thanks for your help....................

[Courtney_L]

Hey dg_lbe,

Were you able to get things up and running using the ActiveX control supplied by the manufacturer? If you're still having trouble, here's a good link in the LabVIEW 2011 help:

https://www.ni.com/docs/en-US/bundle/labview/page/using-activex-with-labview.html

Basically you will have to open an Automation Refnum Control terminal on your block diagram. This will create a reference to your 3rd party application. You can then use property nodes to change properties of this application, or invoke nodes to access the methods associated with this application. When  you're done, go ahead and close the reference out.

I hope this helps!

Courtney L

Applications Engineer

National Instruments

[dg_lbe]

Its been working. Thx for link....