advantages of TestStand over LabVIEW ?

[Ravikumar.C]

What are the advantages of TestStand over LabVIEW, why to use TestStand? Is LabVIEW alone is enough to develop test sequence?

[Norbert_B · Accepted solution]

TestStand is a off-the-shelf SEQUENCER to create, debug and run test routines on units under test.

LabVIEW is a graphical programming language.

Essentially, you can write a custom sequencer using LabVIEW (or other programming languages), but TestStand is already this with a great deal of flexibility.

hope this helps,

Norbert

[Ravikumar.C]

Thanks Norbert, I agree with your points.

[RaviShrigiri]

TestStand is a test sequencer software.It manages your tests.TestStand will take care of scripting the tests,reporting,database update.

Also it will allow you to loop,introduce errors,run tests in parallel,multi threads,run in LV dev,run tests in LV RTE,etc.

Additionally TestStand supports .net,CVI languages also ( you can interface any non LV codes also in your test routine).

To run tests withing labview you need to generate additional scripting logic.( which also needs to be validated/maintained - typically you would prefer to focus on your main job rather than this...)

If your application is small and very specific then you can use labview only for scripting purpose.

But as the application grows the scripting requirements will also grow and its better to use a specialsed software which does it...in this case TestStand.

Hope this helps..

Ravi S

National Instruments

[Ravikumar.C]

Helps a lot:) this is one of the common question in interviews.

Thanks a lot:)

[SachaE]

Hiya, just to clarify, as you can see from the postings, TestStand is much more than a sequencer of tests. If you referred to it as Test Management Software, then that's a more proper definition of where it sits in your software architecture.
It doesn't do any interfacing to hardware in itself but step types allow you to forge that interface and where those preconfigured steps don't action your step the way you need, then you rely on a lower layer in your software architecture to craft that capability, such as LabVIEW.
Ultimately this is software so it was written in a programming language in itself so you could write a simple sequencer in LabVIEW but to write a whole Test Management suite to handle reporting, database interaction, UUT tracking, user management etc etc, then there's significant time spent doing this initially and maintaining it.
Some useful background information can be found here :
http://www.ni.com/teststand/applications/

Thanks
Sacha