Thursday

Learn about New Feature

I'm working on documenting a new version of LabVIEW, a graphical programming environment. Because of my experience with and knowledge of LabVIEW, I often document advanced features. That's the case with the topic I'm working on today, multithreading support.

This morning, I meet with Brian, a developer in my group, to discuss multithreading support. I don't know anything about multithreading, and I'm unsure how this feature impacts documentation. To prepare for the meeting, I read through Brian's proposal and research multithreading. I learn that multithreading applies to computers that have multiple processors. Multithreading takes advantage of these processors by executing different parts, or threads, of an application at the same time.

But I have some questions. How does a multithreaded application work in LabVIEW? Who will use this feature? What tasks will they want to accomplish? I also want to find out the development schedule and work through a rough time line for the documentation.

In the meeting, Brian shows me an example of a multithreaded application using LabVIEW. From that demonstration, I develop a better a sense not only of what this feature is but how it will be implemented in LabVIEW. In the meeting, I also learn more about the targeted audience—advanced users for whom performance is important.

After getting together with Brian, I create a documentation plan. In that plan, I map out the changes I think we'll need to make to our existing documentation. I also rough out a schedule, including major milestone reviews. I'll circulate this documentation plan to both my manager and Brian. After I receive feedback from them, I'll draft the text that we'll include for multithreading.

Run on the Trails

During lunch, I go for a run on the trails around NI. Sometimes, I'll go to one of the nearby parks, but I'm keeping my run short today. After my run, I stop at our on-site fitness center for some light weight lifting, stretching, and a shower.

Staying healthy is emphasized at NI. In addition to the staffed fitness center, NI offers classes like yoga, step aerobics, and even a boot camp class taught by a real Marine drill instructor. We also have on-campus basketball and sand volleyball leagues as well as an annual three-mile race.

Although I'm running solo today, I'll often join others from NI. We have an active running community here. In fact, we have our own company-sponsored team that participates in local races such as the Statesman Capitol 10,000 and the Austin Marathon.