Useful Tools

When configuring a PXI from scratch, there are several tools and shortcuts that could be implemented to simplify routine procedures or debugging these are:

Adding an alias to read the log messages the rtexe app logs during boot

  • SSH into the PXI, using the admin user

  • Open the .bashrc file with vi -> $ vi .bashrc

  • Add the following line to the admin user .bashrc file.

    alias labviewmessages="cat /var/log/messages | grep LabVIEW_Custom"

  • Save the file and exit

  • Reload the .bashrc -> $ source .bashrc

Loading the rtexe onto the target PXI

  • Download the built version

  • Extract the *.zip file

  • Copy the contents of the startup or bin folders into the /c/ni-rt/startup/ folder from the target PXI. Example:

    $ cd C:\Builds\MainAxesPXI\MainAxisControl\c\ni-rt\
$ ls
startup
$ scp -r startup/* admin@<target IP or hostname>:/c/ni-rt/startup/
(a list of copied files appear)

    For builds with the rtexe inside a bin folder the command from the example changes to scp -r bin/* admin@<target IP or hostname>:/c/ni-rt/startup/

Making sure the PXI will boot from the installed rtexe

For the PXI to boot from the provided rtexe built app, there is a configuration setting from the NI real time environment that must be set. This setting is located inside /etc/natinst/share/lvrt.conf for NI Linux RT targets. Here the following sections must be set:

  • RTTarget.ApplicationPath=/c/ni-rt/startup/startup.rtexe

  • RTTarget.LaunchAppAtBoot=True