Using LabView v9 vs v8.6

[MotorHead]

The ship kit came with Labview version 8.6 and I already have version 9 installed for my work. Does anyone know of a reason why I cannot use version 9? Are there compatability problems with any other software?

[Joe Ross]

I'm not sure if it is possible but in the long run, even if you could get it to work, I think it would be far simpler to use the FRC version. NI has said before that there should be no issues installing the FRC version along side a newer or older version of LabVIEW.

The FRC version of LabVIEW comes with several different toolkits (or portions of the toolkits). It has the RT, control design & simulation, FPGA, Vision, and I might be missing a few. FRC requires that you use a certain cRIO image, which is installed with the FRC LabVIEW. I'm not sure if this image which is based on 8.6 can load and run VIs built with 2009.

It's also important that you are using the same version of LabVIEW as your students so you can better help them.

If you're really interested in taking this on, I'd suggest you ask at the NI forums at http://www.ni.com/first

[Greg McKaskle]

The issue(s) that are likely to occur will more likely be caused by driver issues than LV. I believe it is pretty important to use the same version of VISA on both the cRIO and the host, and since the drivers are rev'ed from time to time, installing more than one version of LV is a sneaky way of updating the old LV to use new drivers. Many times things are fine, but this hasn't been tested that much except on our development computers. It is unlikely that beta testers or formalized testing focused on this.

Greg McKaskle

[ASTDan]

Don't install the FRC LabVIEW version if you have Regular LabVIEW on your machine. Create a virtual PC and install the FRC version on that. It will save you much pain and anguish.

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/virtual-pc/