System and method for programmatic creation of a task specification in a graphical program. A graphical program is programmatically analyzed. The graphical program implements a task, and includes a plurality of interconnected nodes that visually indicate functionality of the graphical program, including a function node that requires a task specification as input. The task specification includes hardware and/or software specifications for performing the task. The task specification is programmatically generated in response to the analyzing, and programmatically provided to the function node as input, where the function node operates to execute in accordance with the generated task specification to perform at least a portion of the task. The analyzing, generating, and providing are performed at run-time of the graphical program, e.g., during execution of the graphical program, and may be invoked or performed by a graphical program execution system, by a node in the graphical program, or both.