LabVIEW should display the number of selected items in Project Explorer, block diagram, and front panel

[Petru_Tarabuta]

Excel displays the number of selected cells.

VS Code displays the number of selected characters.

LabVIEW should display the number of selected items in the Project Explorer.

LabVIEW should also display the number of selected items on the block diagram and the front panel.

Notes

• In the Project Explorer the functionality would be useful to count/monitor/audit the number of VIs and CTLs in a lvclass, lvlib, or in a virtual folder of these owners, etc. It would be nice to know at a glance "oh, there are 12 public VIs in this class".
• The block diagram count functionality can become more useful in large projects and VIs. For example, I recently edited the block diagram of a VI in a DQMH-based project. The project contains 16 DQMH modules at the moment (more to be added). I wanted to check that the VI I was editing was calling the Start Module.vi public VI of each of the 16 modules (wanted to check that the VI would launch all DQMH modules). The only way to do this was to "manually" count the VIs on the block diagram. Selecting them and LabVIEW displaying "Count: 16" would have been easier.
• In the block diagram the information displayed by LabVIEW could be more nuanced. For example, it could display the total number of items selected (subVIs, nodes, property nodes, etc), but also a breakdown based on item type: number of VIs, number of nodes, number of property nodes, etc. All these selection stats may occupy too much space for all to be displayed at once. Perhaps they could be displayed in an element that, when clicked, expands to present all the information.
• The block diagram and front panel count functionality would enable programmers to quickly estimate the complexity of a VI. Pressing Ctrl + A on a block diagram to select all items, then looking at the selection stats would reveal the relative complexity of that VI.
• If a whole structure is selected on the block diagram, then the count should return the count of all items contained in the diagram, not just the items displayed to the user. For example, if a case structure is selected, the number of items contained in all cases should be displayed.

Thanks

[fefepeto_kb]

I think there are major differences between the examples brought up and LabVIEW like applications.

Excel displays statistics about the selected area. Count is only one of the possible displayed values, and it has been auto-chosen since at least one cell contains text. It can display sum or average when only numeric cells are selected.

Visual Studio and VS Code display the number of characters because that is the smallest unit. In LabVIEW that would be the node, which, in my opinion wouldn't help at all. It would include all terminals, subVIs, built in operators, structures etc.

Having the detailed enumeration is a difficult question. How detailed it should be, and which is the most important for the developer? Number of nodes/wires/terminals?  What about conditional and normal disable structures? Shall all cases count?

I think the same goes for the front panel. The numbers would be weird if there are decorations, subpanels, controls and indicators. Not to mention .Net panels that might have objects inside.

For the project explorer window, I think a lot of information could be shown, and possibly at once. In order to not spam the idea, I suggest to rather have user selectable columns, where the number of sub-items could be one of them. The other useful feature regarding the columns would be sorting. But that bring another complexity, whether the developer wants to sort inside one project item or trough the whole project. Does the later option include dependencies or not.

>The block diagram and front panel count functionality would enable programmers to quickly estimate the complexity of a VI. Pressing Ctrl + A on a block diagram to select all items, then looking at the selection stats would reveal the relative complexity of that VI.

Under Tools/Profile menu there is a VI metrics... utility for that. It might be some more clicks, especially for getting the information that is needed for the current VI only, but already exists. Shortcut can be added tough to call the window quickly.

>If a whole structure is selected on the block diagram, then the count should return the count of all items contained in the diagram, not just the items displayed to the user. For example, if a case structure is selected, the number of items contained in all cases should be displayed.

My question here: shall the structure and all substructure count as well?

>The block diagram count functionality can become more useful in large projects and VIs. For example, I recently edited the block diagram of a VI in a DQMH-based project. The project contains 16 DQMH modules at the moment (more to be added). I wanted to check that the VI I was editing was calling the Start Module.vi public VI of each of the 16 modules (wanted to check that the VI would launch all DQMH modules). The only way to do this was to "manually" count the VIs on the block diagram. Selecting them and LabVIEW displaying "Count: 16" would have been easier.

I would like this to be rather part of the find window. Like when I'm searching for all the instances of a VI, or for an operator I would love to see a tree like structure, where each VI calling the code would be a tree node. If there are more than one, a parenthesis could be displayed with the number of calls.