LabWindows/CVI Idea Exchange

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It would be nice if there was a library function to retrieve version information about an executable or DLL file.  I know this can be done through the SDK, but it's somewhat inconvienent.

 

Along the same lines, it would be nice if there was a library function to retrieve the version information about the currently running process.  (this would be great for making "About" panels in programs)

Right now, it is possible to add a readme file to the distribution (Build / Distribution / Edit...). Unfortunately, the file type of a readme file (and the license agreement file) is limited to *.rtf. 

 

It might be useful to distribute a more 'complex' readme file, e.g. including figures. Hence I would prefer to distribute readme.pdf instead of readme.rtf

 

Using LabVIEW you are advised to use error codes from 5000 to 9999 and from -8999 to -8000 for user defined errors (none of the LabVIEW libraries use these ranges).

In CVI several libraries use different error code ranges, but there isn't any range explicitly reserved for user defined errors.

I think that this could be an useful feature.

Using CVI I can't find an easy way of moving inside a source code file.

Based on my experience with other C editors, I suggest these 3 little features that I think are really useful:

  • a shortcut to jump to the beginning of previous function in the same source file (CTRL + PGUP, for example)
  • a shortcut to jump to the beginning of next function in the same source file (CTRL + PGDWN, for example)
  • the current function where the caret is, displayed in the toolbar. It will be nice if you use a combo so that the user can jump to a different function with a simple mouse click (see attachment)

I have thease features in an open source C/C++ editor (Code::Blocks) I use for other projects, and I think they're really useful to reduce the coding time.

When you have large source files with a lot of functions, with CVI is't difficult to easily see where you are inside the file; moreover it's quite common scrolling the file jumping from a function to another.

If you select an User Interface control you can move it to a new location in two ways:

  1. through Arrange >> Control Coordinates you can set the new (X, Y) position
  2. moving it of a predefined offset every time you press one of the keyboard arrows, or of one pixel (SHIFT + arrow)

Using the arrows is an easy way if you want to move the control of a little quantity, but it's difficult if you need for example 200 or more pixels.

Moreover with Arrange >> Control Coordinates you can set the new location for a group of selected controls using the "All" buttons.

But if you want to move a group of controls of a desired offset you can only use the arrows.

 

I suggest the implementation of specifying either an absolute position or an offset throug the Control Coordinates window, both for a single control and for a group of them.

In the project window you can organize the project files into some "virtual" folders (Source Files, Include Files, ...)

If you right-click on the project name, you can add a folder with the item "Add Folder...".

If you right-click on one of these folders, you can add one or more files files.

 

But it's impossible to create a subfolder of one of these folders.

 

Every large project has a lot of files (sources, ini-files, images, icons, ...), so I think it's quite common having them saved into different "real" folders and subfolders. If you don't explicitly add these files to the project, you can add them to the distribution kit browsing your hard disk "real" folders, but in this situation the absolute path of the files is used. And if you move all your project from a PC to another one you won't be able to recreate the distribution kit without errors if you don't save the whole project to the same folder you use in the first PC.

And this is a really big problem.

For files explicitly added to the project, instead, the relative path is used, and this is OK, so the best situation is to add all the files in the project window.

So it's necessary create a full structure of virtual folders and subfolders.