labview 2011 crashes - where to start to debug?

[Bauch@Berkeley]

Hi NI Community,

I have a rather extensive application and once in a while when I start overnight scans, e.g. 50000 of data points and 10 hours of measurements, Labview completely crashes and shuts down. This is the error report generated:

####
#Date: Mon, Aug 13, 2012 11:22:39 AM
#OSName: Windows 7 Professional Service Pack 1
#OSVers: 6.1
#OSBuild: 7601
#AppName: LabVIEW
#Version: 11.0 32-bit
#AppKind: FDS
#AppModDate: 06/22/2011 15:12 GMT
#LabVIEW Base Address: 0x00400000



8/14/2012 12:00:16.853 PM
Crash 0x0: Crash caught by NIER
File Unknown(0) : Crash: Crash caught by NIER
minidump id: aea22ce6-400f-40a6-b595-8ef5700f4fa1
ExceptionCode: 0xC0000005
0x01AA0EC9 - LabVIEW <unknown> + 0
0x01AA1408 - LabVIEW <unknown> + 0
0x7C37FDB4 - MSVCR71 <unknown> + 0
0x77AC74DF - ntdll <unknown> + 0
0x77A89EC5 - ntdll <unknown> + 0
0x00000000 - <unknown> <unknown> + 0

 It happens with Labview 2010 as well. Since the error is not reproducible easily, where can I start debugging?

Erik

[Daniel-E]

Hey Erik,

As you said, it's going to be a challenge to find the issue since it's not easily reproducible. But I can think of a few things we can try as far as troubleshooting steps:

1. A good first step with these kind of errors is to reinstall LabVIEW, so I'd try that first.

2. "ntdll" (at the bottom of your error report) is a Windows kernel dll, and its inclusion in the crash log suggests to me that this might be a greater issue with corruption in your Windows install. I'd suggest trying a repair install of Windows or perhaps reimaging the hard drive to remove OS corruption as a possibility. If reimaging isn't a possibility, do you have another machine available to try running the code on? That might help narrow down whether it's a problem with your installation or not.

Also, are you using any NI hardware with the VI causing the error? We might want to research that to see if it could be contributing to the issue.

So let's start there, and if the error persists, please post back and we'll figure out where to go next with the troubleshooting.

Thanks,

[Bauch@Berkeley]

Hi Daniel,

this is a freh install of Labview 2011 on a brand new computer. The crashes occurred on a second computer as well, where the program was running on Labview 2010. So I tent to, unfortunately, rule out the underlying OS and the Labview installation as the culprits and think it is a Labview bug. I am not surprised, since it is not the first one of that kind I experience throughout my time with Labview. I would like to change the code accordingly, as a work around, but have now idea where to start from since I have no ability to see if it is an array I am writing to, a graph that I display, or whatsoever.

Erik

[Daniel-E]

Hey Bauch,

The fact that this is happening with a VI that's taking a large number of measurements over a long period of time suggests to me that it might be a memory usage issue. In particular, creating arrays with the Build Array function node can  cause memory problems when used with large amounts of data.

So, a few questions:

-Does the crash happen right when you start the VI, or does it happen after running it for a period of time? If the crash doesn't happen immediately, do you know approximately how long the VI usually runs before crashing?

-Would it be possible to get a screenshot of your code so I can look at it and see if anything sticks out to me as far as memory usage goes?

-What are the specs (CPU/memory/HDD) of the computer you're running the VI on, and are you using any hardware devices with the VI?

Also, here's a reference article about memory usage in LabVIEW; it includes information on how to monitor memory usage in the VI and methods for optimizing memory usage. http://zone.ni.com/reference/en-XX/help/371361H-01/lvconcepts/vi_memory_usage/

Finally, do you have access to the Desktop Execution Trace Toolkit? There are some tools in there that might be helpful for tracing memory usage issues.

Thanks,

[Ben]

Bring up Windows ask manager and watch the meory usage and if possible check it often and as close to the time of the crash as you can.

Running out of memory is the most common explanation for LV crashing after logging a lot over a period of time.

Ben

[Bauch@Berkeley]

Thanks guys,

that might be it. I will keep an eye on the memory usage and look also into the advanced analyzing tools. I'll keep you posted.

Erik