Windows 8 touchscreen stop working with LabView application

[cosborne]

This is sort of long shot after googling for days.

On 2 different tablets (Asus with W8 and Sony with W8.1) the touchscreens stop working while running a LV2013 application.

This occurs about 50% of the time with time to failure ranging from a couple of minutes to an hour (or never in 50% of the runs).

A bluetooth keyboard confirms that the tablets aren't locked up and the LV application is still running normally -- just no touchscreen operation.

The application is logging data to a file at a slow rate (<1K bytes per minute).  It's a small application so I don't beleive memory is an issue.

The same application runs without any issues on a laptop but there is no touch screen interface to worry about.

A power reboot returns the touchscreen to normal.

Are there any known issues with LV and the touch screen interface on win Win 8?  Is there some type of "magic" key combination that disables/enables the touchscreen?

[Lennard.C]

Hi cosborne,

Thats one interesting project you have there. So just to confirm with you:

1. You have developed and run the same LabVIEW program and its application on the same tablets. But you have encountered and error only when running the LabVIEW application in the tablet?
2. When you say touchscreens stop working, meaning that all the front panel functions is not working? 
3. Can you provide that LabVIEW code which you used to build that application? I would like to see what is inside the LabVIEW VI which might cause the problem.

Thanks 

Warmest regards,

Lennard.C

[cosborne]

Thank you for the reply.

To answer your questions:

1. Its the same application on the tablets and the laptop but it's really designed (font and control size) for the smaller screens of the tablets.  The laptop doesn't have a touch screen so I can't confirm that the same thing wouldn't happen on the laptop hardware.  Another big difference is the laptop is a Win7 OS and the tablets are Win8 and Win8.1

2. The tablets continue to work properly except for the touch screen which no longer responds in any way.  The hardware buttons work and a bluetooth keyboard and mouse also function properly.  Of course the external keyboard and mouse are only normally available in the lab -- on site they would not be available so the user can only do a hard reboot with the power button.

3.  Unfortunately I can't include the code.  When I get back from traveling I will try to create an small example to demonstrate the problem.

This was built in a hurry so the testing is mostly being done by the end user (they wanted a quckly delivery beta).  Most of the code is from a long established application so there isn't too much thats new.  Basically it was a UI update.

My only guess so far is that there might be an issue between the file system access and the touch screen driver.

[Lennard.C]

Hi cosborne,

I would say running your LabVIEW VI or its applications in Windows 7 OS laptop will work. But I'm not certain about how you run those exe in Windows 8 tablet. I would presume that the Windows 8 tablets you have runs the same as the Windows 8 in Microsoft Surface Pro (Runs on Windows 8 not Windows RT). 

1. Okay, have you installed LabVIEW inside the tablet before (I'm not sure about Windows 8 tablets). If not, have you created an installer which includes LabVIEW Run Time Engine 2013? (Ref link: http://zone.ni.com/reference/en-XX/help/371361H-01/lvhowto/build_installer/). 
2. So in other words, everything other than LabVIEW, works properly?
3. Do send me the code if possible. At the meantime, perhaps you can create an EXE for a VI which has a simple function (e.g. reading an increment value from a running while loop or reading the string value from Elapsed Time Express VI) 

Warmest regards,

Lennard.C

[MajorTom]

Hi cosborne,

Unfortunately Windows 8 and 8.1 are not fully supported on LabVIEW 2013 yet. It sounds like there is a driver issue going on. Is there any way you can put Windows 7 on your tablets?

http://www.ni.com/labview/os-support/

Regards,

Tom Niewiara

Applications Engineer

National Instruments

www.ni.com/support 

[tmf171]

You can also make your own touchscreen using "mouse up" events and numeric/keyboard pop-ups. Since we go back and forth between touch screen and non-touch screen we need a way to menu drive if we want touch screen support or not. There are VIs located somewhere on the website (forums or idea exchange) that can do exactly that. It may be the workaround you need to continue application development and have it compatible with all versions of windows. If you are really interested I might be able to find the old post.

[cosborne]

Hi Tom,

Thanks for the information.  Is there an official schedule for Win 8 support in LV2013?

I may be able to purchase the Win7 OS and install it for the existing tablets but that will be a pain and a significant cost.

Is LV2014 going to support Win 8?

[Jeff-P]

Hello everyone,

To clarify - Windows 8 is supported with LabVIEW as of LabVIEW 2013. The reason the page that Thomas linked to indicates only partial support for Windows 8 is because the FPGA module does not support Windows 8 or Windows 8.1. LabVIEW itself fully supports Windows 8. Windows 8 RT is a different story, we do not support Windows 8 RT.

Historically we pick up support for new operating systems in our next release after the operating system was released. LabVIEW 2013 does not support Windows 8.1 officially, but it is a reasonable assumption that our upcoming release of LabVIEW 2013 SP1 will support Windows 8.1. I actually use Windows 8.1 with LabVIEW 2013 on my laptop, so I don't see any reason why it wouldn't work, but it is not yet officially supported.

If you are running into problems with Windows 8, we want to get those reproduced and filed as CARs.

Thanks,

Jeff Peacock 

Product Support Engineer | LabVIEW R&D | National Instruments 

[cosborne]

Thank you for the clarification Jeff.

Significant update (I'm getting these reports from users and won't be back in the lab to do the test myself for another 2 weeks):

The problem is just on the Win 8.1 tablets and seems to be specific to 8.1.

Some of the tablets that had been shipped with 8.0 were upgraded in the field to 8.1.  These were the ones along with the shipped 8.1 tablets that had the touch screens disabled.  

The 8.0 tablets that were not "upgraded" do not have this issue.

BTW, these are not Win RT and we are using LV2013 32bit 

[Lennard.C]

Hi cosborne,

Actually, they have mentioned something about this here: http://www.ni.com/white-paper/14278/en/

My guess is that as long as you are using tablets that are running on Windows 8 (not Windows RT), it should be okay. If you plan to run your exe file in the Windows 8 tablet that has yet to be installed with LabVIEW, make sure you create an installer to include LabVIEW Run Time Engine 2013 (if you are building it on LabVIEW 2013). Else, just run the .exe and it should work like any other PC with Windows 8 (but you can only run in the desktop).

Warmest regards,

Lennard.C