I found [LabVIEW] easier to work with than java This is what we call "damning with faint praise". I agree that the de-emphasis of state and the stream-based p

I found [LabVIEW] easier to work with than java This is what we call "damning with faint praise". I agree that the de-emphasis of state and the stream-based programming model are wins for LabVIEW. (Though the real win is: It seems to support every piece of lab hardware by one means or another. This is a difficult feature to give up.) It's the mere mechanics of LabVIEW programming - the need to massage a layout of wires that were difficult to draw, read, print out, diff, or version-control - that used to drive me crazy. Though the last time this came up on HN a National Instruments employee turned up to say that things have improved since last I used LabVIEW. Apparently they've lavished attention on the design problem of virtual-wire layout and tracking.