Question

Problem 1

Weekly assignment 2 (15%)

Briefly discuss the definition, parts, advantages, applications, and examples of some projects done using LabVIEW. For the project’s examples, you need to include up to six references showing projects used LabVIEW to perform that project. In this problem, you need to write maximum about one page.

• Formats:

• Font Type: Calibri font

• Normal paragraph font size: 12 points

• Headings titles: 14 points

• Spacing: 1.5 spacing

Answer 1

Laboratory Virtual Instrument Engineering Workbench (LabVIEW) is a system-design platform and development environment for a visual programming language from National Instruments.

LabVIEW is used for 4 main purposes:

· Automated Manufacturing test of a component/sub-system/system.

· Automated Product design validation of a component/sub-system/system.

· Control and/or monitoring of a machine/piece of industrial equipment/process.

· Condition monitoring of a machine/piece of industrial equipment.

· LabVIEW environment tools

Basic parts of LabVIEW.

• Strings

• Numeric

• Waveforms

• Dynamic Data Type

• Loops

• Arrays

• Clusters

• Decisions

Within the LabVIEW environment there is a good selection of tools to assist the development of the overall programmes. These tools include:

1. Templates & sample projects:   This is a tool that features some of the common templates that can be used for starting projects along with some fully formed projects that can be used to see how projects may work, or to be customised for particular applications.

2. Example finder:   This has many hundreds of code snippets that illustrate the methodology behind a huge variety of different tasks. These can be used or customised as appropriate.

3. Debugging tools:   As with any project, debugging is an essential element of any development. The LabVIEW environment provides some comprehensive tools to assist with the speedy debug of programmes. The tools include elements like probes, breakpoints,, single step, highlighting execution (the ability to slow execution to see how the system operates and thereby isolate issues in a dynamic manner).

4. Hardware manager(Measurement & Automation Explorer): This is a complementary tool to LabVIEW. It enables drivers to be managed – updated and monitored. It also allows the monitoring of validity of the connection to hardware before running the programme.

5. Source control:   The LabVIEW environment has several tools to provide configuration management. This enables larger teams to work together on an applications whilst still retaining proper configuration management to be undertaken.

6. LabVIEW tools network:   This element of the LabVIEW environment enables the downloading of specialised toolkits for specific applications. Some are provided by National Instruments, whereas others may be provided by NI partners.

Advantages:

· Easy to use because of the graphical interface

· Intuitive and easy to understand

· Dynamic debugging

· Multithreading and multicore support

· Built in basic functions and components

· Highly customizable and can be used for the simplest functions to highly complex programs

· Easy interfacing, lets you connect multiple devices and programmable boards for development

· Efficient coding because of code reuse

· Addons and third party plugin support for extended functionality

· Complexity is broken down and errors can be found easily

Disadvantages:

· Expensive licensing for creating stand-alone applications

· Slower application performance compared to programs written on native languages like C, most apparent in applications involving multiple components and hardware

· Higher system requirements

· Dependent on specific runtime environments, libraries and has prerequisites not already installed on computers

· More suited for testing and measurement purposes

· No international standards like C.

Applications

LabVIEW finds optimal usage in a couple of sectors, and is used, as mentioned earlier, all over the world. Here’s some applications of LabVIEW:

1. Wind turbine monitoring
2. Oil and gas pressure monitoring
3. Power quality monitoring
4. Machine control monitoring
5. Commercial and industrial robotics
6. Customized control and measurement
7. Machine condition monitoring
8. Data acquisition
9. Signal processing
10. Instrumentation control
11. Aerospace and transportation systems control and monitoring
12. Embedded systems testing
13. Device and component prototyping
14. Industrial automation
15. Weather monitoring and warning systems
16. UI design for instrumentation
17. Industrial and commercial result/output generation systems

Six Projects where lab view has been used

1. Spacecraft: Virgin and SpaceX use LabVIEW.

2. Large Hadron Collider

3. Positive Train Control radio systems are all tested with LabVIEW

4. Mining equipment runs on LabVIEW

5. Smart farming applications.

6. Lockheed Martin uses LabVIEW to test a lot of their space-level products.