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When you first open up LabVIEW, the Getting Started Window will appear. From this window, you can start new code, open saved programs, get help, look at examples, and access articles.To open up new code, click on the Blank VI Targeted to NXT. This will give you access to all the functions that you will need to program your TETRIX robot.

All LabVIEW code is made up of the Front Panel and Block Diagram. The Front Panel contains all of the knobs, buttons, and indicators. The Block diagram is where the the code resides and is where you will end up spending most of your time programming.

When programming in LabVIEW, you will be using the controls and functions palette. The controls palette allows you to place knobs, indicators, controls, etc. onto the Front Panel. The functions palette is where you access all the functions you need to program code on the Block Diagram. Both palettes can be accessed by right clicking on their corresponding window.

One of the most useful tools you will use in LabVIEW is Context Help. This tool can be accessed from the help or by pressing Ctrl+H. Context Help allows you to hover over any function in LabVIEW and get a diagram of its terminals and a brief explanation of them.  It also explains the overall purpose of the function, and it gives you a link to get more detailed help.

In this section, you will be introduced to the TETRIX Move Servos.vi. This TETRIX function allows you to start a single motor, multiple motors, or grouped motors in a certain direction and with a certain power/speed.  In order to link the motors on the robot to the TETRIX function, you will need to create a configurator. You can access the Motor Configurator under the Tools drop down menu, NXT tools. After inputting information into the configurator, you will be able to access it from the TETRIX toolkit.

In order to use your program on your TETRIX robot, you will need to know how to use the NXT Brick. The Brick is the power source for the robot and it stores the code. To navigate through the Brick, you will use the four buttons located on front. The Brick has a USB port for uploading programs, but you can also load programs via Bluetooth. The Brick also has three ports for motors and four for sensors. To learn how to upload programs onto the Brick and  to learn more about navigation, watch the Lesson Video located on the side bar.