USB DAQ 6501 distribution

[stc100]

Now that my development based on the USB 6501 is completed, I am searching how to deploy the runtime application on different machines each equipped with a OEM 6501 and some of my hardware. The deployment of the USB 6501 is giving me headaches. I've included the 2 required assemblies into the GAC, (NationalInstruments.common and NationalInstruments.daqmx) and included the required dll into the system path (NationalInstruments.common.dll and .xml  and NationalInstruments.DAQMX.dll and .xml)
I am still missing some runtime dll as well as the USB 6501 driver.
I don't want to install the 400mb from the CD into the runtime machines, and I don't see into the documentation the information I need.
 
Question1: Where is the USB 6501 driver is to be found? (On the CD... but where ?)
 
Question2: What runtime Dll do I have to include (Of course this wil depends of the functions used, but where are they anyway ?)
 
Thank's for your support.
Thierry
 

[stc100]

The reason to ask the same question again is that I am not satisfied with the answer. Installing 400mb+ of software to deploy a few kb of drivers and dll is not an acceptable solution...
 

[reddog]

For a deployed application using DAQmx, DAQmx must be installed on the target machine.  Since DAQmx provides driver support for numerous NI products, the packaging isn't always as straight forward as it might seem (it's not as simple as copying one or two binaries into the system directory).  To remove this burden of packaging complexity, NI recommends using an installer built by NI for deploying DAQmx support along with your application. 
With that said, there are some options for making the NI installer provided in your software distribution smaller.  You didn't mention which ADE you're using, but LabVIEW, Measurement Studio, and CVI all provide similar mechanisms for building a custom NI installer.  Since I'm most familiar with LabVIEW, I'll explain how it's done in LabVIEW with hopes it will provide enough hints for building it in CVI and Measurement Studio if you're using one of those environments instead.  For LabVIEW, it requires the use of LabVIEW 8.0 and you must be using a project.  From the project window, right click on the Build Specifications icon and select New->Installer from the menu.  In the category pane of the window that pops up, highlight Additional Installers.  You should now see a list of National Instruments installers that you can combine into a single installer for deployment purposes.  In addition, you should also see an Install Type pull down menu which has installer specific packaging options.  With DAQmx 8.1, you have options for Full, Runtime, Runtime2, and Runtime3.  The various flavors give you options for deploying DAQmx without ADE support (only required for development purposes), without the DAQ Assistant, and without documentation.  With these flavors of DAQmx you should be able to reduce the footprint by approximately half.  Even with this reduced size, I realize that for many applications this may still seem excessive.  NI is continuing to investigate smaller packaging and deployment options and will provide new options in subsequent DAQmx releases as they become available.  In the mean time, if you have any questions on the existing packaging options, please post back. 

[stc100]

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[Tom W [DE]]

Hi jeroen-
Which development environment are you using to create your software?  As reddog mentioned, there are now options to deploy reduced NI-DAQmx installations to deployment targets.  Choosing the correct strategy will depend on the requirements of your built application.
Specifically, these questions are important:

- Which ADE is being used?  The most convenient method is available via NI LabVIEW 8.x, NI CVI 8.x.

- Do you use the DAQ Assistant or LabVIEW Real-Time in your application?

- Does your software rely on device configuration via MAX (i.e. do you hard-code device names in your code, etc)?

Thanks-

[Tom W [DE]]

Hi Jeroen-
Yes, this info is helpful.&nbsp; One of the DAQmx Runtime versions should be able to reduce the installer size significantly for your application.&nbsp; We plan to post those to the web soon, but in the meantime please contact <a href="http://www.ni.com/support/" target="_blank">support</a> via email and they should be able to supply a standalone installer for your app.&nbsp; I will post back to this thread when the web downloads are available.
Thanks-

[Tom W [DE]]

Hi Andy-
Yes- the NI-DAQmx runtime versions are now available from the ni.com Drivers and Updates section.&nbsp; Here's a direct <a href="http://digital.ni.com/softlib.nsf/websearch/1CAFEC237C5D5D488625722000531213" target="_blank">link</a> to the download page.

[LA 75]

Andy,
&nbsp;
Thanks for your feedback, we take it very seriously. We are currently working on ways to make our installers smaller. It is not as easy as it sounds, but we understand it is a big issue for some customers, so we do have plans to try to make those customers successfull.
&nbsp;
Thanks,
&nbsp;
Luis