Overview

Make no mistake about it: LabVIEW is a programming language, and a sophisticated one at that. It takes time to learn how to use it effectively. After you buy the program, you should go through the tutorial manual, and then hopefully you'll take the basic LabVIEW class, and later the advanced LabVIEW class; even though it costs money and takes time, it's worth it. Ask any of the MBAs in the front office; they know the value of training in terms of dollars and cents as well as worker productivity. Remember to keep working with LabVIEW; training goes stale without practice. There is a great deal of information to absorb. It's good to read, experiment, and then read some more. For the purposes of this book, we assume that you've been working with LabVIEW and know the basic concepts.

Another thing you should do is to spend plenty of time looking at the example VIs that come with the LabVIEW package. Collectively, the examples contain about 80 percent of the basic concepts that you really need to do an effective job, plus a lot of ready-to-use drivers and special functions. The rest you can get right here. Remember that this book is not a replacement for the user's manual. Yes, we know, you don't read user's manuals either, but it might be a good idea to crack the manuals the next time you get stuck. Most folks think that the manuals are pretty well written. And the online...