tooltip on block diagram

[awang_synovus]

Hi everyone,

Currently, I am working on showing a tooltip at any position on the block diagram at run time. I am trying to use .net framework function (tooltip.show) to show the tooltip;however, a "System.NullReferenceException" error showed up. I am using the window's reference instead of a control's reference because I want to show the tooltip on the block diagram instead of the front panel. And I am not sure if this actually causes the rror.

Does anyone work on this function before? Or does anyone has a different appraoch to this tooltip feature?

Your help is much appreciated!

[P@Anand]

Are you trying to show the tooltip on BD during the edit mode or Run Mode?  Generally you can see the tooltip when you move the mouse pointer over the terminals of a Functions/Sub VI. Are you trying to do more apart from this? And if it is yes, then what is the reason to do this? I am just trying to understand your sceanrio.

[crossrulz]

What information are you trying to give with the tooltip?  Everything you should ever need on the block diagram can be found with the Context Help and the Probe Window.

[awang_synovus]

Thank you for your reply.

I will explain more on the implementation of the tooltip. What I intend to do is to make tooltips with customized descriptions that could be displayed anywhere on the block diagram rather than displaying the default tooltip near a subVI or function. and this will be a daemon that create stooltips for the block diagram of other VIs at run mode. I apologize if my description is not clear. Please let me know where I can elaborate.

[P@Anand]

Why do you want to display a tooltip anywhere on the Block Diagram? It's meaningless to display a tooltip on the Block Diagram unless there is an object. What is the actual reason to do this?
Assuming you can do this, then what is the message you will display, where will you display and how will you make sure the mouse pointer is not changing?
Please explain what you planned to do on the top level what will be the benefit for the user?
I am trying to understand and give you a useful suggestion.

[awang_synovus]

Thank you P@Anand

I am actually intending to create a balloon popup that can help the programmer to locate the error source on a block diagram without interrupting the execution of the program. Let's say there is an error happening in a VI that a software developer is running. My program will show the error on a balloon popup that will be created near the error source subVI. So I am guessing the tooltip function in .net framework might be the approach. 

[jcarmody]

I couldn't find a block diagram property related to Tool Tips, but here's a very rough pass at a crazy idea.  You could create a free label that follows the mouse pointer over the block diagram (or gets put wherever you want it) and adjust the Text property as appropriate.

[billko]

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@awang_synovus wrote:

Thank you P@Anand

I am actually intending to create a balloon popup that can help the programmer to locate the error source on a block diagram without interrupting the execution of the program. Let's say there is an error happening in a VI that a software developer is running. My program will show the error on a balloon popup that will be created near the error source subVI. So I am guessing the tooltip function in .net framework might be the approach. 

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That's pretty ambitious.  But how does this differ from using proper error handling with call chain?  Instead of stopping on an error, you could log it.