Environment Options

Select Options»Environment to open the Environment dialog box.

Note  Refer to the Persistence of LabWindows/CVI Dialog Box Options topic for more information about where dialog box options are saved and what they affect.

Use the View section to set the following options:

• Hide windows when application is running—Hides all LabWindows/CVI windows until execution terminates or a breakpoint occurs.
• Use only one browse info window—Overwrites the current browse info window each time you select a new file, function, variable, data type, or macro.
• Auto hide Project Tree and Library Tree—Removes the Project Tree and the Library Tree from the Workspace window when they are not in focus. To view the Project Tree and the Library Tree again, hover or click in the bar to the left of the Workspace window.
• Show tabbed Workspace—Displays open function panels and .c, .h, .uir, and .fp files in tabs in the Window Confinement Region.
• Show Welcome Page at startup—Displays the Welcome Page, from which you can view the most recently used projects, launch NI Example Finder, create a project based on a project template, view Web resources, view LabWindows/CVI documentation, and access other commonly used resources.

Use the Debug section to set the following options:

• Lines in Debug Output window—Shows the last n number of lines that you specify.
• Bring Debug Output window to front whenever modified—Allows LabWindows/CVI to bring the Debug Output window to the front whenever your program adds text to the window.
• Copy standard I/O to Debug Output window—Copies the contents of the Standard I/O window to the Debug Output. You must enable this option prior to debugging in order for LabWindows/CVI to copy the contents to the Debug Output window.
• Enable data tooltips—Allows LabWindows/CVI to display the values of variables and selected expressions when you place the mouse cursor over the variables or selected expressions in a Source window.
• Enable extended Variables/Watch window displays—Enables the Variables and Call Stack and Watch windows to display extended information for certain data types that you can use when debugging your LabWindows/CVI application. This option is enabled by default; however, if the debugger operates more slowly than you expect, disable this option to increase the speed of the debugger.
• Enable global debug break key—Enables a system-wide hot key to suspend the execution of your LabWindows/CVI program or the Interactive Execution window. You can use this hot key when LabWindows/CVI is not the active application. Enabling this option might interfere with other applications (including your program) that use <Ctrl+F12> for different purposes. The hot key also might not work correctly when you are debugging two applications with LabWindows/CVI at the same time. The hot key is active only when LabWindows/CVI is running a user program or the Interactive Execution window.
  
  The Run»Terminate Execution command is assigned the <Ctrl+F12> shortcut by default.

Use the File Browsing section to set the following option:

• Default directory—Sets the directory location that LabWindows/CVI defaults to when opening files. You can select one of the following locations:
  
  
  • Current working directory—The directory you most recently accessed.
  • Project directory—The directory of the active project.
  • Active window directory—The directory containing the file in the active window or tab. This option is the default.

Use the Source Code Browse Information section to set the following options:

• Generate browse information policy—Determines at what point LabWindows/CVI regenerates source code browse information. LabWindows/CVI generates source code browse information when you load a project, unless you select the Disabled option. Subsequent generation occurs on edit, on compile, or on save, depending on which of the following options you select. Browse information is generated only for source files that belong to the current project.
  • Disabled—LabWindows/CVI never generates source code browse information.
  • On edit—LabWindows/CVI generates source code browse information when a project file is being edited. This is the default setting. LabWindows/CVI might not be able to generate complete source code browse information if there is a compile error in the code.
  • On compile—LabWindows/CVI generates source browse information when the file is compiled. LabWindows/CVI might not be able to generate complete source code browse information if there is a compile error in the code.
  • On save—LabWindows/CVI generates source code browse information when a file is saved.

Use the Interactive Window section to set the following options:

• Include project files in Interactive window—Enable this option if you run function panel or Interactive Execution window code that has dependencies on other files in the project.
• Include loaded instrument drivers in Interactive window—Enable this option if you run function panel or Interactive Execution window code that has dependencies on a loaded instrument driver. Note that using the File»Open option opens the instrument driver but does not load the program file attached to the instrument driver. You must select Instrument»Load to ensure that LabWindows/CVI loads the program file.

Use the Auto Backup section to set the following options:

• Enable auto backup—Enables LabWindows/CVI to periodically back up .c, .h, .prj, .uir, and .fp files while you are modifying them.

  Note  In addition to enabling auto backup for your files, you must also save your files at least once for LabWindows/CVI to automatically recover them.

  LabWindows/CVI follows this process for saving a backup of a file: LabWindows/CVI tries to save the backup file in the same directory as the original file, using a filename created by appending ~cvi and a timestamp to the original filename. If LabWindows/CVI cannot save the file to the directory where the original file is stored, LabWindows/CVI saves the backup file to the system temp directory. If that fails, LabWindows/CVI tries to save the backup file to the system temp directory using a temporary name. If that also fails, LabWindows/CVI does not save a backup of the file.

• Auto backup interval (minutes)—Sets the auto backup interval from 1 to 120 minutes.
• Save changes before compiling—Determines if LabWindows/CVI automatically saves unchanged files or prompts you to save before compiling the project.
  
  • Never
  • Ask
  • Always (the default setting)
• Save changes before debugging—Determines if LabWindows/CVI automatically saves unchanged files or prompts you to save before debugging the project.
  
  • Never
  • Ask
  • Always (the default setting)

Use the Advanced section to set the following options:

• CVI environment sleep policy—Each time LabWindows/CVI checks an event from the operating system, it can put itself in the background, in sleep mode, for a specified period of time. While LabWindows/CVI is in sleep mode, other applications have more processor time. However, LabWindows/CVI might run slower. You can specify how much LabWindows/CVI sleeps. You have the following sleep policy choices:
  
  • Do not sleep
  • Sleep some (sleep a short period of time)
  • Sleep more (sleep a longer period of time, the default setting)
  
  The setting that is optimal for you depends on the operating system you are using and the other applications you are running. Generally for Windows, National Instruments recommends the Sleep more mode. If you think you might need to make an adjustment, try the different settings and observe the resulting behavior.
• Include Paths—Opens the Include Paths dialog box, in which you can specify the directory search path for include files.
• Source Code Control—Opens the Source Code Control Options dialog box, in which you can select settings for your source code control system.

Use the Encoding section to set the following options:

• Character set for interpreting ANSI strings—Specifies the character set that will be used to interpret ANSI strings. The default setting is System Codepage, the ANSI character set the operating system is currently using.
• Warn when file encoding doesn't match the project encoding—Displays a warning when the file encoding does not match the project encoding.
• Convert projects to UTF-8 on load—Enables LabWindows/CVI to automatically convert projects to UTF-8 encoding on load.