The LabVIEW (Laboratory Virtual Instrument Engineering Workbench) is a graphical programming environment developed by National Instruments (NI). It is widely used by engineers and scientists to develop applications for data acquisition, instrument control, and industrial automation. What makes LabVIEW unique is its graphical programming language, called "G". Instead of writing lines of text-based code, developers build programs, known as Virtual Instruments (VIs), by placing icons (nodes) on a block diagram and connecting them with "wires" that represent the flow of data.
This dataflow programming paradigm is highly intuitive for many technical users, as it closely mirrors the structure of a flowchart or a scientific experiment's block diagram. LabVIEW has extensive built-in libraries and toolkits for a vast range of tasks, including mathematical analysis, signal processing, and, most importantly, instrument control. It has native support for various communication interfaces like GPIB, USB, LAN (Ethernet), and serial, and it integrates seamlessly with driver standards like VISA and IVI. This makes it exceptionally easy to connect to a programmable power supply, send commands to it (e.g., to set a voltage), and read back measurements, all within the graphical environment. The ability to quickly create a custom user interface (the "front panel") with knobs, buttons, and graphs makes it ideal for building sophisticated test systems and control applications with minimal traditional programming effort.
National Instruments LabVIEW product website: What is NI LabVIEW? Graphical Programming for Test & Measurement