NI-VISA 5.1.2 exits/closes right after launching it on a Linux CentOS 6.2 PC, also crashes LabVIEW when trying to create VISA ref constant for VISA Open.

[MountainMan12]

After installing LaBVIEW 2011 and NI-VISA 5.1.2 on a CentOS 6.2 PC, I had noticed a problem with trying to use the VISA vi's in LabVIEW, basically it's not working for me, LabVIEW crashed when trying to create a control or constant for the VISA Open vi.  Tried to launch the VISA tools, they all start and then close abruptly.  NI I/O Trace only shows one line.

I did read though many threads and decided to collect the NI system.log, which is attached. (system.log.gz).  I did notice a strange message in here about nivisaserver:

/usr/bin/tail --lines=25 /var/log/messages:

May 22 11:18:48 localhost abrtd: Package 'nivisaserver' isn't signed with proper key

May 22 11:18:48 localhost abrtd: Corrupted or bad dump /var/spool/abrt/ccpp-2012-05-22-11:18:48-3258 (res:2), deleting

Thanks!

[Kira_T]

Hi MountainMan,

This problem maybe because CentOS is not supported with our drivers. Please try running this on a supported distribution. Please find a list of distributions that our software and drivers support here.  Please post back if using a supported distribution does not help to resolve the issue that you are seeing. Thank you.

Regards,
Kira T

[Kira_T]

Hi MoutainMan,

Also, please try running the graphical test panels as a troubleshooting step.  It would be interesting to see if you experience similar behavior when you try to run the test panel.  Please find a link to a KnowledgeBase article about these test panels here.  Thanks!

Regards,

Kira T

[MountainMan12]

When I tried the graphical test panels... the panel opens up and stays up for about 1 to 2 seconds and then closes by itself (ie, crashes).  Here is the debug log of it attached, the error or issue seems to be with the Intel processor ID, not sure how to fix it, maybe I need to update a particular Linux RPM, I don't know which one.   My PC is a Dell, a quad-core Intel i5 series processors.

[Kira_T]

Hi MountainMan,

Thank you for the additional information. Is this still on the CentoOS or have you tried to switch over to a supported distribution? Thank you.

Regards,

Kira T

[MountainMan12]

This is still CentOS 6.2, which is the free version of Red Hat Enterprise Linux.  The Linux kernel is this same between Red Hat Enterprise Linux and CentOS.

[JoeFriedchicken · Accepted solution]

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MountainMan12 wrote:

After installing LaBVIEW 2011 and NI-VISA 5.1.2 on a CentOS 6.2 PC, I had noticed a problem with trying to use the VISA vi's in LabVIEW, basically it's not working for me, LabVIEW crashed when trying to create a control or constant for the VISA Open vi.  Tried to launch the VISA tools, they all start and then close abruptly.  NI I/O Trace only shows one line.

I did read though many threads and decided to collect the NI system.log, which is attached. (system.log.gz).  I did notice a strange message in here about nivisaserver:

/usr/bin/tail --lines=25 /var/log/messages:

May 22 11:18:48 localhost abrtd: Package 'nivisaserver' isn't signed with proper key

May 22 11:18:48 localhost abrtd: Corrupted or bad dump /var/spool/abrt/ccpp-2012-05-22-11:18:48-3258 (res:2), deleting

---

Hi MountainMan,

Thanks for attaching the system report log -- I believe I have a solution for you 🙂 Let's look at a few of the lines:

890: /proc/meminfo:
891: MemTotal:        3894712 kB

1726: /proc/iomem:
...
1784: 100000000-12dffffff : System RAM

1807: /bin/dmesg:
...
1820: BIOS-provided physical RAM map: 2576: [nipal] More than 4GB of addressable memory detected.
...
1838: BIOS-e820: 0000000100000000 - 000000012e000000 (usable)
...
2576: [nipal] More than 4GB of addressable memory detected.
2577: [nipal] This configuration is not supported.  Check the release notes for more information.

Starting at the bottom at lines 2576..2577, dmesg had more than just the NI-VISA server signing notification. At system boot, the NI kernel modules refused to load because they detected more than 4 GB of addressable memory. But, if you look towards the top at lines 890..891, meminfo says you have less than 4 GB of system memory, which makes it seem like the NI modules don't know what they're talking about. However, if you look at the report from iomem a little further down on lines 1726..1784, system RAM has been re-mapped above the 4 GB boundary. While your system doesn't have more than 4 GB of RAM, some of its memory has addresses above 4 GB, which the NI modules cannot use and so they refuse to load. How did that happen? Your system BIOS provided a physical RAM map with usable addresses above the threshold (line 1838).

The fix here is simple -- you need to tell the kernel to reserve addresses above 4 GB [1] so that it won't remap the RAM to higher memory. Once all of the RAM has addresses below the 4 GB threshold, the modules should load and VISA/LabVIEW/et al should stop misbehaving.

It seems to me that LabVIEW is not handling this situation very gracefully, and maybe you can work with Kira to file a bug report.

[1] Re: Successful SUSE linux and DAQmx install; nilsdev and other utilities missing.

http://forums.ni.com/t5/Multifunction-DAQ/Successful-SUSE-linux-and-DAQmx-install-nilsdev-and-other/...

[MountainMan12]

Thanks a lot Joe, it worked with adding that line for the memory.

[AlanYe]

Could you please let me know how to add that line for the memory? My labview crashes all the time when opening VISA icon. Thank you!

[AlanYe]

My system has redhat Enterprise Linux 8.6 installed. My labview crashes every time when I open visa icons. 

Could you please let me know where to add that memmap=60G$1x00000000 line? Thank you!