Are you excited about NIWeek? Here at VI Shots, we definitely are and to prepare you for what's to come. I assembled 3 session speakers for you to talk about their sessions and what to expect. I also go through a run-down of some sessions that I recommend. There are also some activities that are not part of the official schedule which we talk about…

NI recently announced a small form factor instrument that packs a punch called VirtualBench. I interviewed Chris Delvizis, a Senior Product Manager at National Instruments about this new hardware. Aside from containing several instruments essential to a typical benchtop lab setup. It also works right out of the box with built-in software for the PC…

The Actor Framework, is a LabVIEW framework that has a growing following. It allows you to build powerful applications that can contain asynchronous processes and allow them to communicate in a more robust manner. Jack Dunaway and I talk with Allen Smith, Dr. James Powell and Dave Snyder about what exactly is the Actor Framework and how they've bee…

How do you support your LabVIEW applications remotely? Have you found the right tools and methods that make your job easier? In this episode of VI Shots Live, we look at some of the benefits and pitfalls of remote collaboration and support. Jack Dunaway and I talk with Fabiola De La Cueva and Justin Goeres on the topic of being a remote developer. …

Waterloo labs is at it again with another creative project that merges LabVIEW, NI hardware and the maker mind-set. How about standing in front of 3 paintball guns as they automatically “draw” an outline of you? How about if the software controlling them was written by an NI intern? It turns out, this system is pretty smart and fun. Check out the v…

I'd like to thank everyone for the positive feedback on our first VI Shots live, both in personal emails and also on our Google+ page. We're back with a new live episode which was recorded on Feb. 26, 2014. You can listen to the podcast version of the show above or watch the embedded video below. Are you looking for a LabVIEW consultant for your ne…

We've all heard of the Agile Software development methodology; but how many of us are actually using these principles while developing LabVIEW code? My guest, John Sextro is an Agile coach and an expert in the field of Agile Software development. Listen to this episode of the VI Shots podcast where I ask John about the Manifesto for Agile Software …

I've started something new here with Jack Dunaway from Wirebird Labs. We've decided to host monthly Google hangout sessions to discuss the business of software engineering with LabVIEW. The first one this month was held on Jan 29th, 2014 and was called: Sustainable Careers in LabVIEW. You can listen to the podcast version of the show or watch the e…

Using Subversion with LabVIEW is a challenge when it comes to some of the most popular free tools like Subversion (SVN). Eric Metzler from Viewpoint Systems took on the challenge of updating an older version of an internal company tool. The new free version of the TSVN tool won the LabVIEW Tools Network Product of the Year award at NIWeek 2013. Eri…

Jack Dunaway from Wirebird Labs is on this episode where we discuss his Deploy product and what it takes to develop great software products. Jack also announces a new “framework” he will be releasing in 2014 called Featherweight. Links to Content Mentioned: Deploy – LabVIEW Tools by Wirebird Labs Inspired – Book by Marty Cagan VIPM Idea Exchange Wi…

If you think you know everything there is to know about functional globals, then you're wrong. In this episode of the VI Shots podcast, Nancy Hollenback and I take functional global variables to the next level. Find out how to safely use native globals, have multiple instantiation capabilities and speed optimize your look-up tables. I hope you enjo…

Christina Rogers is a software engineer in the LabVIEW R&D group. She primarily works under the hood of LabVIEW adding much needed features and capabilities using C++. Sometimes she dives into G code, as she did to implement the LabVIEW Getting Started window. She's worked on features that you may have not noticed. In this interview we go into some…

Do you want to create a better software experience for your customers? Do you want to create maintainable code? Listen to this interview with Fabiola De la Cueva. She's a Certified LabVIEW Architect, a LabVIEW Champion and an influential voice in the LabVIEW community. In this interview, I asked Fabiola to list the five things a LabVIEW developer c…

Here's a recording of the VI Shots Live panel I did way back at NIWeek 2012. You'll hear me mention in the recording that this should go live soon after NIWeek. I guess soon meant a year, because here it is. On the panel are Jack Dunaway, Justin Goeres, me, Chris Relf and Brian Powell. We all had fun recording this, I hope you enjoy it.…

Thomas Bress is the author of a new book out on LabVIEW called: “Effective LabVIEW Programming”. This book was released recently and in this episode of the VI Shots podcast, I interview the author, so we can get a better understanding of how it can help you transition from the CLAD level of certification to the CLD level. Thomas has managed to crea…

During this past NIWeek 2013, the Raima Database API for LabVIEW was awarded the LabVIEW Tools Network Embedded Systems Product of the Year Award. I sat down with Scott Meeder who's the Director of Sales at Raima to find out what this toolkit is and how we, as LabVIEW application developers can take advantage of these capabilities in our own embedd…

I had the pleasure of interviewing Steve Watts. I recorded this interview back in February, but only now had a chance to publish it. Steve has been writing industrial software for more than 25 years and began programming with LabVIEW in 1998. He is the co-owner of SSDC Ltd (Structured Software Design Consultants). His book, entitled “A Software Eng…

In this episode I dive into the world of Lego robotics and specifically, I learn about a new version of the Mindstorms educational robotic toy from Lego. At this past consumer electronics show (CES) in January, Lego announced and displayed the Mindstorms EV3. Also, this past NIWeek 2013, I saw a demo of the new EV3 programming environment (based on…

NIWeek 2013 is over and one of the biggest announcements was the release of LabVIEW 2013 with over 100 new features. In addition, a new cRIO-9068 controller which runs the Linux operating system, was announced. Now, a LabVIEW developer can tap into the vast community of Linux libraries available. In this podcast episode I chat with Grant Heimbach a…

I've long anticipated this interview with Brian Powell. The impetus for this interview was a series of blog articles Brian wrote recently. BTW, I suggest everyone go to labviewjournal.com and read the entire series he wrote there. Brian of course is well known as one of the original team members that helped bring LabVIEW 2.0 to market as a software…

One of the benefits of being a CLA (Certified LabVIEW Architect), is that you get to go to the exclusive CLA summit. This is a yearly event held in Austin and Europe for the purpose of discussing topics and issues affecting LabVIEW developers today. Topics range from LabVIEW frameworks to source code control techniques. Best of all, admission is fr…

In this episode, I interview Matthias Baudot from Studio Bods. He's started a new company that just announced a product on the LabVIEW Tools Network called BLT for LabVIEW. From the LabVIEW Tools Network Description: License your own LabVIEW application in a few clicks – no coding required Automatically (and remotely) update your applications when …

Here at VI Shots, one of my goals is to always be expanding my knowledge into LabVIEW and learning new software engineering techniques and ideas. To that goal, I try to bring people on the show that can teach me, and in turn you, something new. This episode of the VI Shots LabVIEW podcast is no exception. We all have, at some point, developed a fra…

In this episode of the VI Shots Podcast. I sit down with Wendy Covey, from Trew Marketing. Wendy founded Trew Marketing with Rebecca Geier back in 2008. Since then, their company has focussed on helping engineering companies uncover their unique voice in the marketplace. As you'll hear in this interview. Sometimes in order to grow your customer bas…

I had the pleasure of interviewing John Bergmans from Bergmans Mechatronics. He's been working with websockets and LabVIEW over the past few years and has evolved his knowledge into a product he calls LabSockets. From his website: The LabSocket System enables LabVIEW applications to be monitored and controlled remotely using a web browser. The syst…

National Instruments has been exploring the mobile space for a couple of years now. They started off with simple utility apps such as the Service Request tracker and NI device pinout documentation tool. They released a mobile app last year which allowed you to view data on an iOS and Android device in a limited fashion. Now with data dashboard 2.0,…

I had the pleasure of interviewing Jeff C Jensen, who is a Senior Lead User Manager for Embedded Systems at National Instruments. We had a very interesting discussion about some of the work he's done with various students and NI employees to interface computers with everyday consumer devices using LabVIEW. All of the work can be found on the LabVIE…

I had the pleasure of speaking with Jeffrey Travis on this podcast episode. Jeffrey has written several LabVIEW related books, has released several open source LabVIEW tools such as LabVNC, LabSQL and LabPerl. He also has a very successful engineering business (Jeffrey Travis Studios ) developing LabVIEW based automation systems. Over the years, he…

LabVIEW 2012 was announced today! You can download it from here. I invited Elijah Kerry, the senior product manager for LabVIEW, on the show so we can find out first-hand about all the new features of LabVIEW 2012. One of the most significant features, this year is the LabVIEW Templates and sample projects. I was a little skeptical of relying on NI…

[Scroll Down for Video] I’m very excited today to bring you an interview I did last year at NIWeek 2011. I sat down with a group of engineering interns at National Instruments. Now these intern positions were not typical. Hunter Smith and Ben James who managed this group of students, gave them the flexibility to do whatever project they wanted, as …

I had the pleasure of talking with Brian Spears and Jassem Shahrani of Sixclear on today's podcast. I had a great time talking about how they got started running their successful business which has LabVIEW as its core. Powered by LabVIEW, if you will. In addition to getting some insights into how they work and collaborate, they also made a huge ann…

A quick podcast interview with Hassan Atassi, who is managing the latest LabVIEW Coding Challenge for the Winter of 2011. Listen to the podcast and find out what the two different challenges are and how you can get involved. The winner gets a sweet Sony Cyber-shot HX9V Digital Camera ($300). Some Deadlines to be aware of: Dec 1st 9:00am CT: Challen…

I'm back from a very long absence. I've been very busy on various projects so I apologize for leaving you with such a huge gap. However, now I'm back and starting the flow of new audio podcast episodes and soon, new videos. In this episode of the VI Shots podcast, I interview the three members of the recently formed Field Architects group at NI. Na…

I've reached the 10th podcast episode! That's a big milestone for VI Shots. Another big milestone is the 25th anniversary of LabVIEW and the release of LabVIEW 2011. To get the rundown of all the new features, I asked Jeffrey Philipps from National Instruments to join me in this podcast episode. Do you know why the new controls palette was named Si…

In this episode of the VI Shots podcast, I invited three members of the LabVIEW community to talk about how to get the most out of NIWeek 2011. I have Darren Natinger from National Instruments, Christopher Relf from VI Engineering and Justin Goeres from JKI. There are a lot of things to see at NIWeek and we cover some of the technical sessions you …

In this episode of the VI Shots podcast I sit down with Terry Stratoudakis who is the CEO of Wall Street FPGA. A company that specializes in the acceleration of trading and financial analytics software using LabVIEW FPGA. This is a new industry in general for LabVIEW and specifically LabVIEW FPGA. I was skeptical at first and a little confused. Whe…

In this episode of the VI Shots LabVIEW podcast I chat with Sam Kristoff and Ben James from National Instruments. Sam was responsible for most of the development in the LabVIEW interface for Arduino toolkit that was released a few weeks ago. I mention in the interview that I was having problems getting LabVIEW to communicate with the arduino under …

In this episode of the VI Shots LabVIEW podcast I chat with Crystal Drumheller from W.L.Gore and Associates in Flagstaff Arizona and Justin Goeres from JKI. Before Crystal worked for her current employer, she worked for National Instruments. That's where she got the LabVIEW bug and hasn't looked back. Both Crystal and Justin mentor FIRST Robotics t…

Several weeks ago, National Instruments hosted an online coding challenge called: Code Madness 2011. In this episode of the VI Shots LabVIEW Podcast, my guests are Grant Heimbach who organized the challenge and Peter Kovacs who was the winner. Peter wrote some awesome code that scans through the NI Community site and returns all the documents avail…

In this episode of the VI Shots LabVIEW podcast, I have Darren Nattinger of National Instruments back to chat about his favorite feature of LabVIEW – Quickdrop. Darren is not new to this podcast. I had him on the show back in episode 002 where he gave us some interesting insight to his background and his unique role at NI. Did you know that Quickdr…

In this 3rd episode of the VI Shots LabVIEW podcast. I sat down with Justin Goeres and we chatted about the NI 2011 CLA (Certified LabVIEW Architect) summit, we both attended, which happened in Austin March 7-8. Justin gives us a run down of all the reasons why you should be attending next year if you are a CLA. I also play a funny clip of Justin d…

In this episode of VI Shots we sit down with Darren Nattinger of National Instruments to see why he is known as the fastest LabVIEW developer around. Darren is a senior software engineer and a Certified LabVIEW Architect and among the few people at National Instruments who codes in G. He shares some of his tips and tricks with us so we can be just …

In this (our first!) episode of the VI Shots podcast, we chat with Ben Zimmer of Enable training and Consulting. We discuss how he started using LabVIEW and how he’s built a growing business around providing training materials. He also talks about his interesting journey as a mentor to FIRST robotics teams and how that has crossed paths with his bu…