Write Readable Variant Data To a Text File

Issue Details

I have variant data that is displaying in a readable format in a variant indicator. How can I convert that readable data to a string and print it to a text file?

Solution

Converting variant data to a readable format can be difficult because it contains both the actual data and metadata about the type and format of the data. Therefore, there is no single function to convert variant data to a readable string. You have to convert the variant back to its original type using the Variant to Data function, and use string conversion functions, such as Number/String Conversion and Path/Array/String Conversion to get the correctly formatted string, which will be written to your file. 

You can refer to the Data Type Parsing VIs palette to parse the variant data appropriately. With those functions you can obtain the metadata of the Variant, and use it to properly define the target type the variant is going to be converted to. 

Additional Information

If your variant is not storing a primitive LabVIEW data type, but a cluster with several elements in it, you can still use the Variant to Data to obtain the cluster type, and use the Flatten to XML or Flatten to JSON functions to generate readable string, but in the XML or JSON format.