error not being an error

[josh824]

My program that has been in development since the beginning of the summer has encountered an error in the previous 48 hours that I haven't been able to figure out.

It should be noted that I'm using LabVIEW 2012 on Windows 8.

In my most recent development, I did add a write to text function...however deleting this block does not make the error go away.

It should be also noted that clicking "Show Error", I am led to the error like normal, except the box that notifies the error's location defaults to the bottom right hand side of my VI, away from all other components of my VI.

What can I do to get rid of this error? Or are there any ideas on how to get it to clear so that the VI can run.

Thanks.

-Josh

[altenbach]

Something seems corrupted. Maybe you could select all visible good code and copy it to a new, blank VI, reassign the connectors and copy the icon over.

[josh824]

I've tried that and it screws up the formatting of everything. I'm sure functionality could be restored via this method but it would take some time. CTRL-U isn't helping or doing anything either...I'm not sure if that's because it is a very large VI composted of many subVIs.

[altenbach]

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@josh824 wrote:

...I'm not sure if that's because it is a very large VI composted of many subVIs.

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I disagree. Most likely, that's not the problem.

Something is corrupted and possible some code is outside the valid diagram area. How big is your diagram in pixels? Can you attach the problematic VI?

[josh824]

44566x3905 pixels is the size of the VI.

I know you're trying to help but I cannot attach the VI for proprietary reasons. Perhaps you can suggest methods to delaing with corrupt sections?

[altenbach]

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@josh824 wrote:

44566x3905 pixels is the size of the VI.

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Ouch! Yes, that's a bit big. See also this article.

Not sure if trying to open in a newer LabVIEW version would help. Maybe you should contact NI tech support to see if anything is salvageable.

I am not sure what you mean by "... screws up the formatting of everything". What is "everything"? What is "formatting"? Screws up how?

[josh824]

There's a format everything is arranged in the original file...everything has it's place. Tons of wires going everywhere that have been intentionally placed in their position via CRTL-U throughout the whole development. When I copy every single component of the back panel into a new file to try to sidestep the corruption, things get moved around. Variables, wires, subVIs, etc... Next thing I know, I have a shmorgageborg of disorganization. Fortunately everything stays wired, but it'd be a pain to wade through all the chaos to get everything back online. I used a lot of local variables and those don't like being copied and pasted for some reason. They default to a generic reference.

[RavensFan]

Whenever I copy all selected components from one VI to another, all of the items copy over intact.  There is no rearranging or disorganization.  My guess is that if that is happening to you, it is another symptom of the corrupted file.

I've never had problems copying local variables either.  Though if you are copying it by one method, try the other.  I'm talking about Ctrl-C, Ctrl-V being one method, and Edit/Copy and Edit/Paste by way of the menus being the other.

The only reason I can think of for a local variable becoming something generic (I'm thinking black box with a question mark not associated with any control) is if you copied the local variable, but didn't have the terminal for that control selected while doing the Copy/Paste. 

[natasftw]

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@josh824 wrote:

There's a format everything is arranged in the original file...everything has it's place. Tons of wires going everywhere that have been intentionally placed in their position via CRTL-U throughout the whole development. When I copy every single component of the back panel into a new file to try to sidestep the corruption, things get moved around. Variables, wires, subVIs, etc... Next thing I know, I have a shmorgageborg of disorganization. Fortunately everything stays wired, but it'd be a pain to wade through all the chaos to get everything back online. I used a lot of local variables and those don't like being copied and pasted for some reason. They default to a generic reference.

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This doesn't really make sense.

Ctrl+U does the opposite of intentionally placing.  In fact, it lets the program place it regardless of where you'd like it.

It sounds like a mixture of your belief and altenbach's belief are correct.  There are two very large problems going on here.

1) Your code is 40 screens wide.  What were you (or whomever wrote the code) thinking?  You've made your code entirely unmanagable.  You can't update anything and know it won't destroy things elsewhere.  You should NEVER made code this large.

2) Ctrl+U is designed to be used with strong programming practices.  The larger your VI, the harder it is for the algorithm to make intelligent choices.  It looks like it made a choice that pushed your Write to Text File VI off the edge of your VI.  There's a maximum size.  This creates a bit of a corruption.  It's there, but it's not.  Do you have any other craziness going on with wires going off the edge of your VI?  That's another tell-tale sign. 

Any fix you undertake is going to mess up the unintentional placing of components using cleanup.  You can either rebuild the VI with the visible components, as already suggested, or use VI scripting to bring every node on the block diagram to a single point.  This has the potential to bring things from beyond the VI size back into the visible region so you can delete the VI in question.

The real solutions for this are:

1) Stop making large VIs.  This is a bad habit to break now.  It doesn't make your VI better.  It just makes it impossible to manage.  It also makes it more than impossible for the next person to work with to manage. 

2) Use the cleanup tool intelligently.  The more you ask it to do, the more you're asking for problems.  Highlight sections of code and clean those up.  Don't try to cleanup the whole VI.  Don't EVER use it to "intentionally" place anything anywhere.  That's the exact opposite of what it's meant to do.When you want to intentinoally place something somewhere, do so.