Reusing code within the same VI (when a sub-VI won't do)

Question

My last question here got awarded a kudos point "for being a great question", which is pretty embarrassing, because at my present skill level it's hard to envisage the time when I'll ever be anything other than a "taker" from this forum !  So here goes with a "dumb" question to try to put the record straight.
My front panel has 17 groups of one button + three numeric indicators, that's quite a lot of front panel items and 8 of the groups have an enum indicator as well.  All of these items are also contolled by property nodes for visibility and/or "disabled".
My program gathers all the data for these items into a Functional Global Variable array, and at end of the main loop it refreshes the properties and the values of all of these front panel items.  It could look unruly, but because of the similarity between the 17 groups the refresh of the front panel items all happens within a neat FOR loop (albeit with a 17-way CASE structure inside it) so at least these controls aren't sprawled out all over my block diagram.
The only problem I have is that my program takes quite a few seconds to initialise and get the loop running, during which period the front panel shows garbage (well, maybe not garbage, maybe data related to the last time the program ran, which may have been a different context, so much better if not visible).
But if I also ran the same "front panel refresh code" right after initialising (wiping) the data in my Functional Global, the result would be that all of these controls would be invisible or disabled, which is a much better place to start from.
But do I have to put a completely separate copy of the loop onto my block diagram to get this effect ?
Making a sub-VI is out of the question, because it's this VI's front panel I am working on.
The word that describes (to me) what I want to do is "subroutine", but in LabVIEW "subroutine" seems to have a very specific meaning, a "stripped for speed" VI that won't touch any front panel anyway.
Is this just a problem of my mindset ?  It's true that in my life by far the most code I wrote was assembler for 8-bit embedded micros, those applications were always strapped for memory.  At this stage of my career the balance won't be tipped however much high-level code I write (yes, I'm a dinosaur).  So I tend to fret about how big my compiled code will be.  Should I just put another copy of the loop (actually it's only the 76 "visible" property nodes I need) onto my block diagram and stop worrying about it ?
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Answer 1

A number of comments.
1) The title of Dinosaur is still up fro grabs with many of us in the running ( I as well used to play the game of "ICan write that charceter in X lines...")
2) When you are doing a lot with the GUI, "Defer FP Updates (its a property of the FP to shut down screen updates, serach for that) may spped things up.
3) I use a GUI controller very often in my apps. I posted about it here.
4) If you chase down my tags I have a collection related to GUI performance.
I'd put the code in a VI called from my GUI controler (that called your FG to get the info).
Regarding memory
When we used to depend on someone with a crochete hook and beads to make our memory, it was justified. Today, memory is cheap and using to save yourself time is just fine. When you worry about memory is when you find the code does not fit into 2 G anymore.
Ben
Ben Rayner
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