Each year Houston is the host to a huge technology conference for the Offshore industry.
This year the 2014 OTC Offshore Technology Convention will be held in the Reliant Center at One Reliant Park in Houston Texas. National Instruments will have a booth 3471 showcasing their latest products relevant to the offshore industry. I'm sure they will have their latest CompactRIO which has many installations in pumping and hydraulic fracturing operations for land-based operations. The proven reliability is perfect for offshore use.
Showing posts with label LabVIEW. Show all posts
Showing posts with label LabVIEW. Show all posts
Thursday
Start NI TestStand training
Here is a list of all the basic NI TestStand documents I can find online. I attended this TestStand 3hr. course a few times. It's only useful if you do all the exercises in the book, then try making your own.
- Hands-On Automated Test Software.pdf
- Automated Test Software Hands-on With NI TestStand and LabVIEW -Presentation.pptx
- TestStand Overview YouTube Video
- Getting Started with TestStand
Saturday
TestStand and LabVIEW basics video
Here is my latest video. It's an overview of National Instruments TestStand test automation software used with LabVIEW to create a PCB testing system.
This video shows how easy TestStand and LabVIEW can be used to create a powerful test automation platform.
I couldn't find a lot of information on how to start using NI TestStand and LabVIEW together to create a PCB test sequence program.
I knew it was easy to do but I didn't realize it was this easy to get started. After one afternoon playing I was able to do this video.
My next video will be a little more advanced.
This video shows how easy TestStand and LabVIEW can be used to create a powerful test automation platform.
I couldn't find a lot of information on how to start using NI TestStand and LabVIEW together to create a PCB test sequence program.
I knew it was easy to do but I didn't realize it was this easy to get started. After one afternoon playing I was able to do this video.
My next video will be a little more advanced.
Wednesday
NIWEEK 2013
I attended my first day of NIWEEK.
It was lot's of fun. I registered my attendance first thing in the morning and the lady accidently gave me a Certified Developer tag for my badge. So I was a CLD for only a day. It was my lucky day. Hopefully it's a sign of the future. Maybe I will truly be a CLD soon.
I attended a LabVIEW seminar on file management in the morning after the keynote speeches.
I skipped lunch and walked around the Exhibit Hall to see all the neat things people have created using LabVIEW and NI products.
I attended a LabVIEW seminar on file management in the morning after the keynote speeches.
I skipped lunch and walked around the Exhibit Hall to see all the neat things people have created using LabVIEW and NI products.
In the afternoon I attended a hands-on LabVIEW training and then a TestStand training. Later in the afternoon, I returned back to the Exhibit Hall to continue learning how others have used LabVIEW to solve a problem or just sort their marbles by colors.
Saturday
Count to Three
Just like a programmer starts off printing "HELLO WORLD" on the screen, in LabVIEW you can start off by learning to count to three. It's not easy or intuitive to find a way to count between two numbers. The key words are "Quotient & Remainder."
On the Block Diagram hit CTRL and then SPACEBAR at the same time to pull up the Quick Drop dialog box. Type in Quotient & Remainder. It should find it by just typing in Quo....
Now add a While Loop around the Quotient & Remainder.
We will use the iteration (i) terminal from the while loop to show the current loop count. The iteration terminal starts with zero on the first sequence. We connect a wire from the iteration (i) terminal to the X input of the Quotient& Remainder.
We need to add an upper limit number to the Y input of the Quotient & Remainder. So Right-Click your mouse over the Y input and Create a Constant. We want this vi to count from 0 to 3. Put a 4 in the constant box. The output will count from 0 to 3 because the first count will be the zero and the fourth count will be the number 3.
Right-click on the upper right output connector of the Quotient & Remainder and create an Indicator. This numeric indicator will be shown on the Front Panel. This is where the numbers will be seen. If you want to use this number for another operation, just add a wire and connect to another vi, or a graph, etc.
You will need to add a Stop button to the front panel for this example and wire it to the Stop if True function of the While Loop at the lower right hand corner. Let's also slow it down a little so we can see the operation working. Add a Wait Until Next ms Multiple icon with 500 as a constant wait time.
Hit run and watch the numeric indicator count from 0 to 3 on the Front Panel. Hit the Stop button to end the process.
Thanks for learning how to Count To Three using LabVIEW with me. Feel free to leave a comment.
We will use the iteration (i) terminal from the while loop to show the current loop count. The iteration terminal starts with zero on the first sequence. We connect a wire from the iteration (i) terminal to the X input of the Quotient& Remainder.
We need to add an upper limit number to the Y input of the Quotient & Remainder. So Right-Click your mouse over the Y input and Create a Constant. We want this vi to count from 0 to 3. Put a 4 in the constant box. The output will count from 0 to 3 because the first count will be the zero and the fourth count will be the number 3.
Right-click on the upper right output connector of the Quotient & Remainder and create an Indicator. This numeric indicator will be shown on the Front Panel. This is where the numbers will be seen. If you want to use this number for another operation, just add a wire and connect to another vi, or a graph, etc.
You will need to add a Stop button to the front panel for this example and wire it to the Stop if True function of the While Loop at the lower right hand corner. Let's also slow it down a little so we can see the operation working. Add a Wait Until Next ms Multiple icon with 500 as a constant wait time.
Thanks for learning how to Count To Three using LabVIEW with me. Feel free to leave a comment.
Wednesday
LabVIEW & Arduino
Labview By Fairweather, Ian (EDT)/ Brumfield, Anne (EDT) (Google Affiliate Ad)
Arduino or compatible device
Install the NI-VISA drivers.
Install JKI VI Package Manager (VIPM) Community Edition (Free).
Install the LabVIEW Interface for Arduino as described here.
Connect your Arduino to your PC as described
in here.
Load the LabVIEW Interface for Arduino Firmware onto your Arduino as described in here.
Once you have everything loaded into the Arduino, attach an LED to pin 9 and build a VI in LabVIEW that will turn on the LED with a switch from the Front Panel of LabVIEW.
Install the LabVIEW Interface for Arduino as described here.
Once you have everything loaded into the Arduino, attach an LED to pin 9 and build a VI in LabVIEW that will turn on the LED with a switch from the Front Panel of LabVIEW.
Sunday
Website scraping with LabVIEW
Scrape or retrieve data from a website using LabVIEW. This is also called data harvesting or data extraction from websites.
One difficulty is finding good HTML data to scrape. Most data like stock quotes have been replaced with dynamic data that doesn't have a clear and consistent text strings that can be searched.
Here is an example that opens a URL website, reads the HTML, picks out a string keyword and displays the data after that keyword.
I've chosen a weather site that has a consistent keyword like "temp"> and the page is dedicated to only one city. So the number after "temp"> will be that city's temperature.
This vi will be great for any instrument attached to a network with a web-page to access.
Use the data socket open and then read to capture all the raw text of the webpage. Then use a string match pattern to search through the text to find the matching strings before the data that you want to scrape. The example show searches through the text of the webpage to find "temp">.
One difficulty is finding good HTML data to scrape. Most data like stock quotes have been replaced with dynamic data that doesn't have a clear and consistent text strings that can be searched.
Use the data socket open and then read to capture all the raw text of the webpage. Then use a string match pattern to search through the text to find the matching strings before the data that you want to scrape. The example show searches through the text of the webpage to find "temp">.
Monday
STEP #4 "HELLO WORLD" using LabVIEW
So you've completed STEP #1 Get LabVIEW and you've worked through the examples given in the tutorials.
Then you followed STEP #2 Get an Arduino.
You checked out your Arduino and now you are ready to program the LIFA files onto the Arduino with STEP #3 Load LIFA.
You need a way to test that everything is connected and working.
You also need to get familiar with both LabVIEW and Arduino together.
Your first LabVIEW project needs to be something very simple and easy to understand.
Most programming languages and starter circuits always have a "HELLO WORLD" to learn from.
Controlling an LED with an on-screen switch would be an easy way you can interface the on-screen controls of the LabVIEW Front Panel with the real-world LED connected to an output of the Arduino.
You can start by adding a switch, a stop button and an indicator LED to your first front panel. You can also add these items from the Block Diagram.
Then you followed STEP #2 Get an Arduino.
You checked out your Arduino and now you are ready to program the LIFA files onto the Arduino with STEP #3 Load LIFA.
You need a way to test that everything is connected and working.
You also need to get familiar with both LabVIEW and Arduino together.
Your first LabVIEW project needs to be something very simple and easy to understand.
Most programming languages and starter circuits always have a "HELLO WORLD" to learn from.
Controlling an LED with an on-screen switch would be an easy way you can interface the on-screen controls of the LabVIEW Front Panel with the real-world LED connected to an output of the Arduino.
You can start by adding a switch, a stop button and an indicator LED to your first front panel. You can also add these items from the Block Diagram.
The Block Diagram shows the connection details of my Arduino Clone. Your settings may very depending on what Arduino device you have connected. You can always find the com port in your control panel, Hardware manager of Windows. Plug your Arduino into the USB jack and see what com port is listed when it connects.
STEP #2 Get an Arduino, or equivalent
The first equipment you will need is an Arduino UNO or compatible device. Here are photos of my Arduino which is smaller than the normal Arduino UNO. This is a clone Arduino. Arduino's come in many different packages, shapes and sizes. Choose which bests works for your situation.
I bought the small board on the left from http://www.adafruit.com/ and the red board connected is the USB to
Arduino board I bought from http://www.sparkfun.com/products/9716
The board on the right is just a block of LED's and a pushbutton connected to the Arduino as outputs and inputs.
I used the USB board and connected it to a proto-board with a 10uf and 16MHz ceramic resonator which creates an Arduino compatable device.
 |
| UNO R3 |
All of these devices can be used to interface with LabView.
STEP #3 LabVIEW Interface for Arduino Setup Procedure
Setting up the LabVIEW Interface for Arduino (LIFA) is a six step process that you will only need to complete once you get LabVIEW setup on your computer and you have an Arduino or compatible device. Please follow the instructions below to start creating applications with the LabVIEW Interface for Arduino. LabVIEW Interface for Arduino Setup Procedure
Nice overview of using Labview-and-Arduino
Nice overview of using Labview-and-Arduino
Tuesday
Top 5 Reasons LabVIEW Makes You More Productive When Using Arduino
Top 5 Reasons LabVIEW Makes You More Productive When Using Arduino
The Arduino microcontroller is a low-cost electronics prototyping platform. With the LabVIEW Interface for Arduino Toolkit you can leverage the power of the LabVIEW Graphical Programming environment to interface with the Arduino in a whole new dimension. Learn how the LabVIEW features listed below will help you increase productivity when using Arduino.
The Arduino microcontroller is a low-cost electronics prototyping platform. With the LabVIEW Interface for Arduino Toolkit you can leverage the power of the LabVIEW Graphical Programming environment to interface with the Arduino in a whole new dimension. Learn how the LabVIEW features listed below will help you increase productivity when using Arduino.
Arduino with LabView
LabVIEW is a National Instruments software package that provides a graphical programming language for interfacing the Arduino micorcontroller.
Check out the NI website for more information: Use Arduino I/O With LabVIEW
The Arduino is an easy to configure, low-cost microcontroller with many built-in functions like:
Check out the NI website for more information: Use Arduino I/O With LabVIEW
The Arduino is an easy to configure, low-cost microcontroller with many built-in functions like:
- Digital and analog inputs and outputs, PWM pulse width modulations, I2C communications, and SPI serial communications.
- Loop rates: USB tethered (200 Hz) and wireless (25 Hz)
- Open Arduino sketch and toolkit VIs help you customize functionality
Friday
LabVIEW for Amazon Associates
LabVIEW can be used to generate links for Amazon Associates.
The Concatenate Strings function can be used to combine elements of the link and combine them all together with an HTML String output. This output was used to create this link below.
LabVIEW 2009 Student Edition
The inputs are the products ASIN number, your Amazon Associates ID number. If you don't have one, feel free to use mine.
Also enter the text to be shown as a underlined link. For different items you want to create links for, you will just need to change the ASIN and Text data. Hit Run, then copy the link from the HTML String into your blog post. It will look like the link above.
The Concatenate Strings function can be used to combine elements of the link and combine them all together with an HTML String output. This output was used to create this link below.
LabVIEW 2009 Student Edition
The inputs are the products ASIN number, your Amazon Associates ID number. If you don't have one, feel free to use mine.
Also enter the text to be shown as a underlined link. For different items you want to create links for, you will just need to change the ASIN and Text data. Hit Run, then copy the link from the HTML String into your blog post. It will look like the link above.
LabVIEW_2010 vi : AMAZONassociates1.vi
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