I have created a system with hardware (a USB DAQ) and software that is to be installed on multiple computers overseas. I want to make the set-up as easy as possible because I don't think the people doing the setup will be very well trained, and I won't be there to fix any problems. I have created an installer that includes all the hardware as well as software setup, but there is one issue left, and I'm not sure what the best way to solve it. If the installer is run before the DAQ is connected, then the installer creates a virtual device. If the DAQ is then connected, it is named Dev1, which doesn't work with any of my tasks, of course. I have some code that runs, and verifies the hardware set-up each time the system is started, so I can see if the device with the proper name is virtual, and if so, I can rename the actual and virtual DAQ device to the right names, so my tasks operate properly. However, I now have a virtual device hanging out on my system doing nothing, which I would like to avoid, because there is an outside chance that I will end up on the phone trying to explain to people how to straighten out a system when it goes bad, and I want to keep it as simple as possible. I have two questions:
Is there some way to delete the virtual device programatically?
Is there some better approach to accomplish what I am trying to do? I thought about not allowing the installer to proceed if there is no DAQ device plugged in, but I don't know if that is possible.