Book Image

Data Acquisition using LabVIEW

By : Behzad Ehsani
Book Image

Data Acquisition using LabVIEW

By: Behzad Ehsani

Overview of this book

NI LabVIEW's intuitive graphical interface eliminates the steep learning curve associated with text-based languages such as C or C++. LabVIEW is a proven and powerful integrated development environment to interact with measurement and control hardware, analyze data, publish results, and distribute systems. This hands-on tutorial guide helps you harness the power of LabVIEW for data acquisition. This book begins with a quick introduction to LabVIEW, running through the fundamentals of communication and data collection. Then get to grips with the auto-code generation feature of LabVIEW using its GUI interface. You will learn how to use NI-DAQmax Data acquisition VIs, showing how LabVIEW can be used to appropriate a true physical phenomenon (such as temperature, light, and so on) and convert it to an appropriate data type that can be manipulated and analyzed with a computer. You will also learn how to create Distribution Kit for LabVIEW, acquainting yourself with various debugging techniques offered by LabVIEW to help you in situations where bugs are not letting you run your programs as intended. By the end of the book, you will have a clear idea how to build your own data acquisition system independently and much more.
Table of Contents (18 chapters)
Data Acquisition Using LabVIEW
Credits
About the Author
Acknowledgments
About the Reviewer
www.PacktPub.com
Preface
9
Alternate Software for DAQ

Debugging - highlight execution


Given the nature of data transfer used in LabVIEW (wires) one of the most useful debugging tools available in LabVIEW is the concept of "Highlighted Execution".

If you click on the light bulb, LabVIEW will slow down the execution of VI, and one or several moving dots will trace the order of execution and transfer of data will be visible and traceable by the programmer. Also, in this state, all the VI starts off dimmed and as the execution continues, the parts of code that are executed exit the dimmed state. Another very important tidbit to notice is that in "Highlight Execution" while the dots travel on the wires that are currently being executed, the actual value that is carried at the moment on that wire is also displayed. The following figure is a partial cropped part of an example code of one of the examples that are shipped with LabVIEW.

Note: the left side of the picture is executed while the right side, where a loop is about to complete execution, is...