Scrolling Horizontally in LabVIEW Using the Scroll Wheel

Issue Details

By default, the mouse scroll wheel scrolls LabVIEW's Block Diagram or Front Panel vertically, Ctrl+Scroll wheel scrolls through cases/events/sequence steps and adding the Shift modifier to either accelerates the scrolling. In order to scroll horizontally, however, the mouse must be be hovering over the horizontal scrollbar. Because of the predominant left-to-right style of diagram organization, it would be excellent to have a more accessible way to scroll horizontally.

Solution

This feature is currently not available natively in LabVIEW. However, the functionality can e.g. be achieved using the following 3rd party AutoHotkey script:

; Shift + scroll wheel functionality in Current LabVIEW
; (tested in LV2015 to LV2019 32-bit and 64-bit on Win7SP1 and Win10):

; === Don't change anything if no LabVIEW window in focus ===
#NoEnv
SendMode Input

; === Select only specified LabVIEW windows ===
; !! Change titles according to your language version of LabVIEW !! 
SetTitleMatchMode, 2
GroupAdd, LVWindows, Front Panel ahk_class LVDChild
GroupAdd, LVWindows, Block Diagram ahk_class LVDChild

; === Change behavior for LabVIEW windows ===
; Scrollwheel: normal vertical scrolling
; Alt+Scrollwheel: faster vertical scrolling
; Shift+Scrollwheel : horizontal scrolling
; Shift+Alt+Scrollwheel : faster horizontal scrolling
; (Modifiers: + is Shift, ! is Alt)
#IfWinActive ahk_class LVDChild
+WheelDown::Send {WheelRight}
+WheelUp::Send {WheelLeft}
!WheelDown::Send +{WheelDown}
!WheelUp::Send +{WheelUp}
+!WheelDown::Send +{WheelRight}
+!WheelUp::Send +{WheelLeft}

; === Change middle mouse button behavior to panning for LabVIEW windows ===
MButton::Send {ctrl down}{shift down}{MButton down}{shift up}{ctrl up}
MButton up::Send {MButton up}

This will be the scroll wheel's behavior when the script is loaded:

• Scroll wheel: normal vertical scrolling
• Alt+Scroll wheel: accelerated vertical scrolling
• Shift+Scroll wheel: horizontal scrolling
• Shift+Alt+Scroll wheel: accelerated horizontal scrolling

The script also alters the behavior of the middle mouse button which normally equals the left mouse button.

Additional Information

Pressing the Shift key while using the mouse scroll wheel will cause the panel or diagram window to scroll horizontally out of the box in LabVIEW NXG 1.0 and above.

There are other tools to navigate a Block Diagram or Front Panel:

• Panning using the Scrolling Tool (hand icon) from the Tools Palette.
• Using the shortcut Ctrl+Shift+Left Mouse Button for the Scrolling Tool. Be aware that using this shortcut will only work when clicking an empty area of the Block Diagram or Front Panel. Otherwise it will duplicate the element under the cursor.
• Using LabVIEW's Navigation Window.