starting other programs using labview

[Lisa]

Hi,

I'm fairly new to LabView but I'm trying to get the software for our
CCD and our MS to start together. Unfortunately, I really don't know
how to do this. I'd appreciate any advice/suggestions. What I need to
do is have one program be started - essentially simulating the mouse
clicking "ok" and then do the same for another program. The difficult
part is that these are 2 different programs (not VIs) from 2 different
companies.
Any suggestions on how to do this with LabView (or another language)
will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Lisa

[sdoctor]

I havent understood your question fully. Is it that you have 2 different softwares which you want to integrate together through labview? I also didnt understand the simulating part?

[josborne]

Its easy to get labview to start other applications (simulate double-clicking on an EXE file). For example, if you wanted LabVIEW to start Microsoft Excel, use the "System Exec.vi". Wire the path to Excel.exe into the command line input of "System Exec.vi":

However, it seems like your question is a bit more complicated than that. Perhaps you could provide a little bit more, Lisa.

I don't know what you mean by "essentially simulating the mouse clicking ok". Does a dialog window pop up after you start the first application?

If so, that might be a bit tougher. I'm not really sure how to simulate clicking on OK in a dialog box in another application. However, you might want to try using the "Quit Application.vi" that is included with the
lvwutil-32 library (avaiable for download from NI's website). With this VI you can specify the name of a "window" and it will automatically "quit" that window (like clicking on the X in the upper right corner of the window). But I don't know if it works for dialogs... and its only for use on Win32 platforms.

Otherwise, you might want to check if the applications you want to control have some kind og Active-X interface.

[GaryLeeThomas]

Great response John-Paul! Can you go into detail about the Active-X interface stuff. Also, can LabVIEW send or receive data (say, from MS Word or MS Excel). Lastly, in retrospect can would you change anything concerning your resonse to the orginal question. I'm also new to LabVIEW, and also interested in interfacing LabVIEW with existin C/C++ code, Matlab and Perl scripts, et cetra.

Thanks,

Gary Thomas
703-377-1500 (work)