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 long as it was extremely awesome. How’s that for some parameters to work within?

Top Row: Hunter Smith, Ben James, Humphrey Huang, Peter Gayler - Bottom Row: Dylan Caswell, Tim Lynch, Me

This group within NI is called Waterloo Labs, and I had a great time talking with them. It’s feels great to see so much excitement in engineering. Some of the projects that have come out of Waterloo Labs is an iPhone controlled vehicle, an Eyeball powered super mario game, a Kinect powered etch-a-scetch. One of the coolest projects so far, I think is something they go in great detail in this interview.

Here are links to items mentioned in this podcast episode:

• Waterloo Labs Youtube Channel
• Facebook Page
• Twitter

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 announcement on the show of a new product they are really excited about unleashing onto the LabVIEW community. Take a listen to find out what it is.

*Keep listening after the closing title of the podcast and listen to some bonus content*

Here are links to items mentioned in this podcast episode:

• Sixclear website
• VI High Video Blog
• Sixclear on Twitter
• Sixclear on Facebook (go friend them)

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: Challenge descriptions become available
• Dec 19th 9:00am CT: Submissions accepted & voting for User Interface Challenge begins
• January 11th 11:59pm CT: Deadline for submissions
• January 13th 5:00pm CT: Voting ends & winners announced

Here are links to items mentioned in this podcast episode:

• LabVIEW 2011 Winter Coding Challenge - Instructions

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. Nancy Hollenback, Brian Powell and Charlie Knapp.

 From their blog:

We are a small, elite group of LabVIEW experts working in large accounts and helping engineers become more proficient in LabVIEW. We guide software architectures, develop technical leaders, and teach and encourage good software engineering.

Take a listen to this episode to gain some insight as to how this group of experts is expanding LabVIEW proficiency among large development teams by promoting good software engineering tools and practices.

Here are links to items mentioned in this podcast episode:

• LabVIEW Journal Blog - Blog of the NI Field Architects
• LabVIEW Large apps Community
• LabVIEW Unit Test Framework
• VI Tester
• LAVA

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 Silver? Listen to find out.

In addition to the new version of LabVIEW, we discuss the NIWeek 2011 keynotes and the “what’s new in LabVIEW” session.

Here’s a hit list of some of the cool new stuff:

• Improved Stability
• New Silver Controls Palette
• Improved Real-Time Deployment
• New Math and Signal Processing Functions
• Application Builder API
• Asynchronous Call by Reference
• Improved Create SubVI functionality
• Create Type Definition from Block Diagram
• Find Add-Ons link in the Getting Started window

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 can attend and how to get the most out of this year’s technology conference if this is your first time or even if you’ve been there before.

I will be at NIWeek this year, so feel free to come up to me and say hello. Most of the time I will be hanging out at the JKI booth on the expo floor. I will also be attending the LAVA OpenG BBQ and will be on a discussion panel called We are the Champions (Tues. Aug 2, 2:15–3:15 p.m. – room 10C).

Here are more links to items mentioned in this podcast episode:

• LAVA OpenG Barbecue
• NIWeek 2011 Program Schedule - This is the complete conference program guide as a PDF. You can search the document by speaker or company name

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. Where exactly are FPGAs used here? No worries, Terry explains it all to us. By the end of the interview, I was all fired up to find other untapped industries where I could use LabVIEW FPGA.

There is a lot of information packed in this podcast episode so you might want to listen to it more than once.

PS: Terry will be at NIWeek this year giving an unrelated presentation (TS3261-The Missing Link – 8/3/11 1:00 PM – Rm: 10C). So track him down if you’re there.

Here are more links to items mentioned in this podcast episode:

• Wall Street FPGA LinkedIn Group
• LabVIEW in Finance ni.com Community Group
• Follow Wall Street FPGA on Twitter

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 Mac OS. Since then I have resolved my issue. It turns out I was using the wrong port. The VISA serial port listings under Mac are not very descriptive and what I thought was the USB port was actually the Bluetooth.

I’ve recorded a detailed video tutorial on how to get started with the toolkit which you can find here.

Here are links to items mentioned in this podcast episode:

• Community Support home for the LabVIEW Interface for Arduino
• Download the toolkit from the LabVIEW Tools Network
• Cool Projects built with the toolkit on the NI Arduino Blog

In this video tutorial, I give an overview of what the Arduino hardware is and how the LabVIEW Interface for Arduino (LIFA) works. I demonstrate a simple program I wrote that scrolls 12 LEDs with a variable speed similar to the lights KITT had in the Knight Rider TV series.

Download Code Used in this Tutorial: (LabVIEW 2010)

There are many Arduino boards out there. A complete listing of all of them can be found here. More information about the Arduino can be found on the Arduino project website.

Overview

The Arduino, is a programmable micro controller board that has several analog inputs and digital IO lines. The Arduino language is text based and is used to create embedded programs which you download to the board.

Step by Step Startup Guide

Here is a step by step process to get up and running with Arduino and LabVIEW:

1. Purchase an Arduino board. You can find them at Sparkfun or other suppliers. Make sure to order a USB cable if you don’t already have one. There are two main boards. The Uno and the Mega. I purchased mine on Amazon.com.
2. Make sure you have LabVIEW 2009 or newer installed. The VIs that are included in the LIFA are saved in LV 2009, so this is the version of LV that you must have to be able to use the LIFA. If you do not have this version of LabVIEW, you can download a 30day evaluation of it from ni.com/trylabview
3. Install NI-VISA Drivers. To LabVIEW, the arduino appears as a serial instrument device. To communicate with serial instruments in LabVIEW, you need to have the latest version of the NI-VISA driver. You can get the latest NI-VISA drivers here. Make sure to select the latest Windows or Mac versions.
4. Install the Arduino IDE and drivers for Windows. You can download them from the Arduino website here.
   • Step-by-step instructions for setting up the Arduino software on Windows can be found here.
   • For Mac look here. Mac does not need drivers but you still need the IDE environment.
5. Install the LIFA. The LIFA is available as a VI package through the LabVIEW Tools Network. You must first install VIPM. Once VIPM is installed, click on this link to get and install the LIFA under LabVIEW 2009+.
6. Upload the sketch ‘LIFA_Base.pde’ to the Arduino. The LIFA comes with a sketch program that must be uploaded to the Arduino before you can use the VIs to communicate with it. You must use the Arduino IDE software (which you installed in step 4) to do this. I show how to do this in the video tutorial – above. The sketch is located at:
   • C:\Program Files\National Instruments\LabVIEW 2010\vi.lib\LabVIEW Interface for Arduino\Firmware\LVIFA_Base\LVIFA_Base.pde
7. Start Playing. For support, join the Arduino LabVIEW community at ni.com/arduino

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 teams and they both participated with their teams in the FIRST championship in St. Louis, Missouri this past April. Have you ever wondered about being a mentor for a local FIRST robotics team? Listen to this podcast to find out first hand from these mentors.

Also, listen to find out how Justin ended up with a bloody head wound during the championship.

Here are links to items mentioned in this podcast episode:

• Crystal’s Team 2486
• Justin’s Team 3459
• Find a local FIRST team to mentor

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 available from various categories and groups. Take a listen to see how the code he wrote led to an opportunity for a spin-off product which Peter is working on releasing to the LabVIEW Tools Network.

Here are links to items mentioned in this podcast episode:

• Peter’s winning entry
• Windows Baloon Prompt using .NET Constuctors
• LabVIEW IP Spark

As we’ve learned back in VISV Episode 003. When building executables that use dynamic VIs, you must make sure to specify the dynamic VI name in the ‘always include’ section of the LabVIEW Application Builder specification. Not doing this will cause problems that manifest themselves as a LabVIEW application that won’t be able to load your dynamic VI and will either raise various errors or cause the application to fail completely. It depends on how critical your dynamic VI is to the overall application.

Making special considerations for dynamic VIs during the build process is an extra step you have to do which can lead to a point of failure. If you create a new dynamic VI in your code then you must remember to update the build spec. Even with the best intentions, this step can still be missed.

Sometimes you are not in control of the build process. For example, your code may be distributed as a toolkit that others use to build their own applications. Informing end users of your code to include the dynamic VIs is a challenge.

In this video tutorial, I will show you a simple way to avoid these problems by following two simple code modifications.

Download Code Used in this Tutorial: (LabVIEW 2009)

*Update*

In the video, you’ll see me use the path from the VI path property wired into the Open VI Reference function. It’s slightly more efficient to use the VI Name property and wire that instead. Since the VI’s already in memory. Using the VI name should work just fine.

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 Quickdrop was written using LabVIEW? It’s true, which would makes sense since Darren programs exclusively in G. There are also several other interesting and useful tips Darren lays down in this episode, including ways on how to make using quickdrop even faster with Quickdrop shortcuts.

Something that was discussed in the show are Quickdrop plugins. Since 2009, there are a few plugins that ship with LabVIEW. My favorite is the one that moves control labels on the diagram from above to the sides using <ctrl + T>.

Here are the links to items mentioned in this episode:

• Quickdrop Overview
• Quickdrop Enthusiasts Community
• Quickdrop ini tokens

In this video tutorial, I share with you a technique that I use, when I want to be selective of how LabVIEW child classes load into memory. Specifically, by using the Factory pattern, I can dynamically load a class into memory and create an instance of a child class on-demand.

It’s important to note that LabVIEW loads classes into memory automatically whenever class objects are used in VIs.

To demonstrate these concepts, I am using a code example from VISV 002. Take a look at that video if you want a more in-depth walkthrough of the code. Here, I attack the problem of how to limit loading of classes to only the ones you need for your current application run.

Download Code Used in this Tutorial: (LabVIEW 2009)

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 discovering an event structure “bug” that caught him and others at the CLA summit by surprise.

I ask Justin about how he got his start in LabVIEW and how he almost became a PLC programmer! We also find out what Popcorn, Twitter and LabVIEW have in common.

Here are links to items mentioned in this podcast episode:

• CLA Community on ni.com
• LAVA Discussion on Justin’s Event Structure bug (video).
• Popcorn Tweets video
• JKI State Machine

As always, discussion is encouraged. Please leave a comment on our site or send an email to feedback@vishots.com

Part 2 of this video can be found here.

This is part 1 of a 2-part video series where we go into detail on how to use dynamic VIs as parallel asynchronous processes in LabVIEW. Topics covered in this video:

• Differences between static vs dynamic VIs
• How to build an executable with dynamic VIs
• How to call a dynamic VI
• How to use the Run VI method
• How to pass data to a dynamic VI

Download Code used in this tutorial: (LabVIEW 8.2)

Do you have any questions? Is there something you want to know about in more detail? Leave a comment below, or send your questions to feedback@vishots.com

*Update*

I have gotten an excellent question in the comments in response to this video. It’s regarding how to close an idle dynamic VI front panel after it has been aborted. I created a short video response with a possible solution. Check it out here.

The basic idea is that you can check if the front panel is open (FP.Open property) after abort, and if it is, execute the FP.Open property set to False. However there is a caveat to this solution as I describe in the video.

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 as fast.

You can find Darren posting on his blog, or writing up a weekly nugget. Here are some other links mentioned in this episode:

• Include LabVIEW Version Number in Application Icon (LabVIEW Feature Suggestion)
• Diagram Cleanup Feedback Group
• Darren’s Weekly Nugget 02/08/2010 (16×16 glyphs that ship with LabVIEW)

When writing a LabVIEW application that communicates with hardware. There are times when you need to have the code functional even though you don’t actually have the hardware in-hand. This could be because of time constraints. For example, parallel software development must happen while the instrument is being shipped or back-ordered. Or you’re presenting the software at a trade-show and you need a working demo without having to carry all the hardware around. In any case, you have to figure out a way to develop your application and work around this problem.

By designing your software around the use of LabVIEW classes, you can easily include hardware emulation capabilities from the start. In this video, I share a way that you can use LabVIEW classes to help you solve this problem.

Download: Code used in this tutorial (LabVIEW 2009)

Do you have any questions? Is there something you want to know about in more detail? Leave a comment below, or send your questions to feedback@vishots.com

By default, LabVIEW stores compiled code together with the VI file. This is something transparent to us and we don’t pay much attention to it. However, this can cause problems which appear when editing your VI. Sometimes when we edit a single VI, we notice that a number of other VIs require saving. Even though we haven’t changed them directly. This is especially painful when trying to keep things in order with source code control.

In this video tutorial, I go through the new feature in LabVIEW 2010 which allows you to separate compiled code from your VIs. This allows you to avoid the problem of propagating changes.

Download: Code used in this tutorial (LabVIEW 2010)

Have you started using this new feature? Let me know in the comments.

*Update*

I have some additional information that I learned after making this video. Thanks to Danny for commenting which prompted me to do some more research:

• Any diagram that contains a ExpressVI or a Statechart VI cannot separate source and object code due to how LabVIEW embeds those subVIs inside their caller. Also a PolyVI can’t be marked, because it doesn’t really have a diagram (although an instance of a PolyVI can be).
• The term now used to describe a VI that does not have its compiled code separated, is: “uni-file”
• At the end of the video, I describe a caveat. To clarify this a bit more. What this basically means is that in order to do dynamic loading of VIs from the LabVIEW Run-Time engine, (as is the case in built executables which call VIs) you must not separate compiled code from VIs. In other words, you must create uni-files.
• In the video, I show how to turn this on for a VI or even the contents of a Project file, but there is a way to enable this feature by default so that any and all new VIs are saved as “source-only” VIs.  This can be done using an ini token: SourceOnlyEnvironment=True. As with any “secret” ini token, it’s not supported and it’s considered experimental.  One side affect to be wary of is that you cannot create a normal “uni-file” with this setting enabled (the VI Property setting is ignored), which is required for dynamically loaded VIs.

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 business interests. We also get some tips on the best way to learn LabVIEW.

This video is from my trip to Atlanta for the 2008 FIRST Robotic Championship.

In this video from RoboBusiness 2008, we interview Steven from Powercast who shows off some cool wireless power technology.

From the Powercast website:

Founded in 2003, Powercast developed a receiver module with breakthrough efficiency levels. Coupled with a transmitter that sends RF energy using algorithms developed by Powercast, the Powercast Wireless Power Platform™ was born. While the concept of sending power “through the air” has been discussed for more than 100 years, Powercast is the first company to make it commercially viable. Powercast is now leading the cross-industry initiative to bring wireless power to a hundreds of low power devices.

A video from NIWeek 2008. Benjamin Cook really had fun building this electric guitar effects system based around NI hardware and LabVIEW.

This is a wireless audio processing project. A 550 MHz transmitter transmits FM modulated data to a 5600 down converter. It down converts the data to 25MHz. That gets sent to a 5640R IF-RIO card. The IF-RIO card has an FPGA. That’s where all the demodulation and audio processing happens which then gets sent out the sound card. You get very low latency audio response.

The big announcement this year at the FIRST robotics finals in Atlanta was the new robot controller from National Instruments. This new controller called cRIO runs a real-time OS and can be programmed using LabVIEW. The power of this new technology will open the door for new and more interesting challenges for future FIRST competitions.One area that is underdeveloped in the FRC category of the competition is the autonomous mode. This is in contrast to FLL which is mostly autonomous. Hopefully we will see some interesting games ahead.

In this video VI Shots interviews Ray Almgren who leads the worldwide academic relations program for National Instruments. We also interview several mentors and students to get their feedback on this change in direction for next years competition. Teams 2023, 1739, 47, 107 and 2053 are featured.

Boston Engineering decided to demonstrate their FlexStack product by attaching it to an iRobot Create programmable robot, have it scan RFID tags and then make it do several dances. FlexStack is powered by LabVIEW Embedded. Take a look at this original VI Shots video.

Roving VI Shots corespondent and LAVA member Justin Goeres participated in the “buy one get one” program that the OLPC foundation announced last year. This is where you spend $400 and you donate one laptop to a child in an impoverished nation and in return you get one laptop for yourself.

I caught up with him and got his feedback on the unit. One thing I learned was that it ships with an application called TurtleDraw. This little app is great for teaching programming in a graphical way. If you’re thinking LabVIEW here, well, take a look and judge for yourself.

Resources:
• OLPC Wiki
• Justin’s LAVA thread on the OLPC

Another video taken at the FIRST final competition of 2008 in Atlanta. NI built a robot called NITRO to demonstrate the powerful capabilities of the new cRIO controller that will be used by the competition teams this year.

In addition to a cool ball shooting mode, NITRO has some advanced image analysis capabilities. Here we see it doing some pattern recognition and executing autonomous moves based on the image viewed.

What is not shown in the video is the ability to execute a specific move just by drawing a series of segmented lines in the provided dashboard application and then transmitting them to the bot. A huge improvement over last year.

The ability of the teams to take advantage of the power of LabVIEW graphical programming is really going to be an asset.

Resources:
• Additional video of NITRO

In this video taken at Robo Business 2008, Jim Lynch gives us an overview of the latest iRobot robot called the Looj.
Resources:

• Looj product page on iRobot

This video highlights the new Compact RIO hardware that will be used as the controller for the 2009 FIRST robotics competition in the FRC category.

National Instruments had a booth close to the pits at the 2008 FRC final championship in Atlanta. They built several robots demonstrating the capabilities of the new controller. One of the robots is shown here and the various components of the control hardware are explained.

Boston Engineering has created FlexStack.

The FlexStack product is a 2.5 inch, rugged platform that takes advantage of the flexibility of LabVIEW Embedded with the power of the Analog Devices Blackfin Processor.

Additional Resources:

• Boston Engineering Website
• FlexStack Information
• LabVIEW Microprocessor SDK

Dexter is a biped teleoperated robot created by the Mountain View, CA based company – Anybots. Dexter’s walking is performed autonomously and is a demonstration of the type of hybrid robot that Anybots is working on. It will mainly be teleoperated but certain tasks will be automated such as walking.

Here’s a VI Shots video of the Anybots team during last years Robodevelopment conference:

Addition resources:

• Anybots
• Dexter’s first steps
• Trevor Blackwell
• Paul Graham writes about Dexter

VI Shots talked with Maria Bualat from the NASA Ames Research Intelligent Robotics Group. Gigapan.org is a website where people can upload super high resolution panoramic photos. These photos were taken by a prototype motorized automated pan and tilt camera mount that figures out the exact positions of all the multiple snapshots required to make an awesome high resolution panorama. Gigapan (gigapixel panorama) was developed by Carnegie Mellon University in collaboration with NASA Ames Intelligent Robotics Group, with support from Google. The price for this technology seems within reach of the consumer market at $279.

At the end of the video, Maria talks a little about here background and the K10 robotics platform which NASA used in the Canadian Arctic recently. The robots, K10 Black and K10 Red, carried 3-D laser scanners and ground-penetrating radar. The two NASA robots surveyed a rocky, isolated polar desert within a crater in the Arctic Circle. The study helped scientists learn how robots could evaluate potential outposts on the moon or Mars.

Resources mentioned in video:

• Intelligent Robotics group
• NASA Robots Practice Moon Survey in the Arctic Circle (Haughton Crater Site Survey Field Test)
• Gigapan Website
• Gigapan Hardware

Additional Video:

In this VI Shots video taken at Robodevelopment 2007, we talk with Ariel Cohen the founder and chairman of Galileo Mobility Instruments. Their company has developed a unique wheel that can transform into a rugged track quickly and easily.

Galileo is the innovator of a unique breakthrough technology, The Galileo Wheel which combines wheel and track in a single component. The simple mechanism enables switching back and forth between the two modes within seconds. The technology enables the device to use wheels whenever possible, and tracks whenever needed.

They are currently looking for partners to adapt their invention to the consumer robotics market after successfully landing a contract with an Israeli defense contractor.

Resources in this Video:

• Galileo Mobility Instruments
• Robodevelopment 2007

Additional video:

In this VI Shots video taken at Robodevelopment 2007, we talk with Paul Roberts, a developer with Microsoft Robotics Studio. Yes, it’s similar to LabVIEW and it can be used as a general purpose language.

Resources mentioned:

• Download Video
• Microsoft Robotics Studio
• Robodevelopment 2007

Braintech demonstrates Volts-IQ to VI Shots.

Braintech’s VOLTS-IQ Visual Intelligence Software Suite provides feature recognition, object localization and robot guidance in the form of Microsoft Robotics Studio (MSRS) services.

VOLTS-IQ uniquely combines Braintech’s proven robot vision expertise with Microsoft’s powerful MSRS service-based architecture. Using VOLTS-IQ, researchers, commercial product developers and hobbyists can “vision-enable” their robotic projects and products with unprecedented ease and speed, leap frogging the traditional barriers involved with vision development and bringing their ideas to life faster than ever.

Resources mentioned in this video:

• Volts-IQ
• Microsoft Robotics Studio
• Braintech
• Mindstorms NXT

National Instruments continuously works closely with Lego to expand virtual instrumentation into the classroom by developing LabVIEW integration with their Mindstorms NXT platform. In this latest VI Shots video we see a demo of an NI product acquired from Hyperception, the Speedy-33. We see how the Speedy-33 combined with a HiTechnic interface can integrate LabVIEW signal processing algorithms to move an NXT based on audio frequencies.

Resources mentioned in Video:

• Infinity Project
• NI Speedy-33
• HiTechnic
• LabVIEW
• Lego

National Instruments had a very small booth at Macworld Expo this year. They were there nonetheless and I asked them a few questions about the current state of LabVIEW on the Mac. I also wanted to find out how, and if, a current Windows user like myself could use a Mac exclusively and still manage to satisfy Windows based LabVIEW project clients. According to Mike Neil, LabVIEW product manager, you can have your cake, er… Mac and eat it too. With the use of virtual machines (vmware fusion, parallels) or bootcamp (which boots the whole machine into Windows), you can now run your windows development environment on a Mac and satisfy any Windows project requirements. Which leaves me asking myself, why am I still on a PC?

Are you working with LabVIEW on the Mac? Tell us about your experiences in the comments.

I came a cross this inventor at Macworld Expo 2008. His name is Matthew Michaels and has come up with this awesome iPhone\iPod touch accessory for hands-free movie watching called iLidz. The idea is simple but the results are huge. Just the idea of not having to hold the player in your hands is great on its own, but add a 4x magnification and the results are hard to believe.

I went to Macworld Expo this year to learn about new technology and instead stumbled across three inspirational teens from Santa Barbara Middle School. They are part of a team of students that are involved with the school Teen Press program. They are currently covering Macworld Expo and in about a week or so will be covering the Santa Barbara International Film Festival.

Check out all their great videos at: sbmsteenpress.org

In this video from RoboDevelopment 2007, we see the CoroBot in action.

CoroBot was created to minimize the complexity of robot development. By combining a powerful PC-class platform with a robust, object-oriented software development system, the CoroBot empowers you to rapidly deploy and develop robotics solutions. The CoroBot also assists the hardware developer with additional physical mounting space, ports, sensors and communication devices.

Keenan Wyrobek from Stanford University is working closely with Willow Garage to continue the development work he and Eric Berger started while in their graduate studies at Stanford University. He shows off PR1 and explains the goals of the Personal Robotics Program and the next generation, PR2. Via Stanford University Website:

Kenneth Salisbury, a professor of Computer Science and of Surgery leads the Personal Robotics Program at Stanford with CS Assistant Professor Andrew Ng in coordination with the department’s STAIR project. After about 18 months of work, they have developed a first prototype. It is remotely controlled now (eventually it will become more autonomous) but it is an early milestone on the way to releasing a practical, affordable and complete robotics platform.

See also: CNET Article

Stephen Litt, a systems design engineering student from the University of Waterloo (Ontario, Canada) shows us how he and three other students replaced a vehicle ECU with a CompactRIO module running LabVIEW Real-Time. What started as a fourth year design project has now turned into a start-up company called WaterlooSPEED. The team documents their efforts on their blog, and in this post, describe how they have the system controllable via a PDA! Now that’s cool.

Steve Hassenplug was there from the beginning when Lego decided to revamp the old RCX platform. He was part of the Mindstorms User Panel (MUP) which was extensively covered in a Feb 2006 Wired magazine article. He was later invited to participate in the Mindstorm Developer Program (MDP) where he built a holonomic drive robot called Omni. This latest version which he shows off in the video uses a compass sensor to keep on track to it’s destination.

• Team Hassenplug
• Article in Wired
• Steve’s Lego page

Mark Balla is a very active member of the LabVIEW community and contributes his valuable time to the LAVA forums. He developed an Icon editor replacement for LabVIEW, is currently a member of the Code Repository review team and is an organizer for the LAVA Coding Challenges. I spent a few minutes at NIWeek this year to talk to him about LAVA and why LabVIEW community involvement is important to him.

Mike Kleinigger is currently a sophomore at RPI (Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute) pursuing a dual degree in Mechanical and Electrical Engineering. In this video He discusses the MOT-V (Medium Object Transport Vehicle) at NIWeek 2007. Unlike the Segway style vehicle, the MOT-V always tries to keep it’s position vertical as oppose to moving forward.We were surprised to see a unicyle which also uses a control system for stabilization.

In this video interview we have Amanda Emnett from the University of Tulsa give us a tour of the vehicle her team worked on for the Challenge X competition. The “brain” of the vehicle control system is powered by a Compact RIO Real-Time FPGA system that was programmed with LabVIEW.Challenge X is a three year national competition that started in 2004. It’s sponsored by General Motors and the US Department of Energy. The objective is to take a GM Chevy Equinox and modify the vehicle to minimize emissions and consumption, without sacrificing utility and performance. Now in its final year, the focus is on delivering a “showroom” vehicle that addresses the requirements of consumers.

• YouTube page with more videos on the car.
• Nice AutoChannel video covering Challenge X.

In this video taken at NIWeek 2007, we interview Rick Francis who is one of the TestStand developers. The only reason this demo is cool is because of the HO sized slot cars. Each car is a “device under test”.

Jay is also a freshman mechanical engineering student at Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology. Jay caught the entrepreneurial spirit at 15 years old and has formed Jbotics Innovations LLC (www.jbotics.com) to leverage his ideas related to internal combustion engines and transmission designs. He currently is pursuing 41 patents on a variety of products. Some of his transmission designs are built into his Lego robots.