multiple windows of various instrument controls

[cmiranda]

Howdy folks,

I'm trying to create a program that allows you to add/delete devices by using a customized run-time menu. For example if I need to control 3 power supplies, I want to be able to go to Instruments->>Power Supply and enter 3. When I do that, I want to see 3 windows appear so that I can configure each power supply differently. However, I need the execution to not take much processing speed because I still need to acquire signals that are time dependant. I'm using LabVIEW 7, any suggestions? I saw some posts on VI servers, would that be the long term solution? Also, this is going to grow into a bigger program where I should be able to add other devices and have them run simultinously. Should I switch from LabVIEW to something else?

[KileenC]

Hi,

You can use LabVIEW’s VI Server functionality to dynamically load and run different instrument control VIs as you need them. Dynamically launching VIs will not load the VI into memory until they are called and can save program space and memory usage. I have attached an example program below that demonstrates how to dynamically launch and run VIs using VI Server. A top-level “loader.vi” uses VI Server to load and run three different VIs.

Also, in case you will need to load and run the same VI for different instruments, I would suggest you use VI templates instead of VIs. This will cause a new VI instance to be created every time the VI template is called. Therefore, you can have multiple separate instances of the same VI when dynamically launch a VI template. There is a good KB discussing how this done.
KB 2QKDG7DW : Differences Between Reentrant VIs, VI Templates, and Dynamic VIs

Hope this helps. Best of luck!

Kileen