Spectrum Viewer 2.6

Site last updated:  Mar-23-2009

version 2.6.3 released

PROGRAM FEATURES

Spectrum viewer: reads and displays XY-plots (up to 4000 in one go) on an XY-graph or as a 2D intensity plot.

Ease-of-use: the program was designed to do simple operations as easy as possible. Zoom in? Draw a rectangle, right-click. That's it. Zoom Out? Just right-click again and you're done. Delete a spike? Draw a rectangle around it, press ctrl-del and it's gone. Shift a plot? Simply drag it to its place. Integrate, differentiate, logarithm? It all happens graphically so you see instant results. No need to learn some complex script language just to do a few simple things. Every function is accessible with the menu or with keyboard shortcuts.

Signal conditioning: smoothing, spike elimination, averaging multiple sets into one, deleting offset jumps, shifting or multiplying plots by dragging them over the graph.

Delete spikes just by pressing ctrl-del (click image for tutorial)

Analysis: Peak area, deconvolution, subtracting a hand drawn background, full width half max, Histogram of Y values, differentiate (per data point or smoothed), integrate, log...

Reads many different XY data files: can read binary files as well as quite strange format text files. You can set a lot of parameters to make Spectrum Viewer read your file flawlessly. For an idea of which text files the program is able to read, look here, here, here, there, to this and to that. If your file is so strange that Spectrum Viewer still won't read it, you can write a plug-in which SV can load automatically during file opening. Create your own native file format support!. 

Easy data exchange: Copy the graph bitmap to the clipboard for use in Word, copy data set tables into the clipboard for use in Excel, or paste Excel tables via the clipboard into Spectrum Viewer. Load bitmaps into Spectrum Viewer to re-create the data by tracing over it. For permanent storage you can also save all selected plots into one file as binary or text (space, tab or comma separated).

Data file organizer: You can select a displayed data set, and then make Spectrum Viewer physically delete the corresponding file from disk. This way you always SEE what you delete, you don't have to remember the name of the file.

Measure program display: With DDE you can make other programs control Spectrum Viewer. After measuring, SV can automatically open and display your measured file.

VIEW DOCUMENTATION

VIEW USER FORUM

Spectrum Viewer program and documentation written by Erwin Timmerman. 

License: Free! 
You may use Spectrum Viewer for commercial purposes to look at data files. You may copy Spectrum Viewer and give it to your collegues or friends. However, you may not distribute copies of Spectrum Viewer from your own web site, or include Spectrum Viewer in a commercial product which you sell to third parties, without my written permission.

What others say about Spectrum Viewer:

"What a fantastic program. Its all the bits of MATLAB code I have written/have been meaning to write in one great package."
"Your program is unique in the way it handles plots graphically and interactively. You've done a great job!"
"One of the best features of SV is how easy it is to copy/paste to/from other applications!"
"The drag spectrum option is brilliant (really cool, I have never come across any commercial software that can do the same function as easily)"
"Your documentation for Spectrum Viewer is world-class!"

Download Spectrum Viewer

VERSION HISTORY

Version 2.6 

• Added LiveCalc: continuous updated calculations
• Extended drag plot mode: you can now change modes within drag plot. Added settable point of origin for multiply, so you can contract or expand your plot while it stays in place
• Added resample to source plot
• Extended full width half max with auto mode and some extra result information
• Added snap-to-plot to line distance and peak area. If plots are selected, only those will be snappable.
• Added "shift lowest element to" to shift y
• Added mouse wheel support for zooming
• Axes can be hidden individually by hiding the grid labels 
• Axes can be auto scaled individually 
• Added file extension recognition for file format presets
• Added an apply button to some dialogs
• Changed the legend: it is now continuously updated to reflect the state of the loaded data sets.
• Expanded the session file format: the legend is now saved as well as plot styles and zoom range.
• Added load session
• Significantly improved the speed of the the copy data set to clipboard command with large data sets
• Fixed a bug in the 2D mode where data sets would not display correctly if they were not identical in number of data points and X values.
• File format panel and data set info panel close with esc, file format panel OK is ctrl-enter.

Version 2.6.1

• Added generate signal
• Added Gaussian smoothing
• Added view lines
• Extended the statistics window: it now works for multiple plots, and the contents are immediately placed on the clipboard.
• Added "step-post and step-pre" to the plot styles
• Selected plots are now drawn last, so they will always be visible, even when there are many plots displayed over each other
• Added a svf test mode for programmers who try to write svf files

Version 2.6.2

• Added two tutorials to the documentation:
  • manual deconvolution
  • re-creating data from hardcopies or bitmaps
• In Drag Plot, point of origin for multiply X, Y and XY is now remembered individually 
• Fixed panning in log mode
• Added Get Gaussian Parameters
• Added "3 Sigma", "All" and "None" to the view lines command
• Added 3 Sigma percentages to the statistics window

Version 2.6.3

• Added Localized Standard Deviation
• Added RC filters
• Added many DDE commands
• Fixed a bug in the special text reading routine where -.3 was read as +0.3

Version 2.5 

• Added data set text
• Added a proper legend
• Drag plot now also works with multiply instead of just shifting. Dragging only part of a plot is possible too.
• The axis menus are now accessible by right-clicking on an axis
• The graph style menu is now accessible by right-clicking on the graph title (the area between the top of the graph and the menu)
• All zooming shortcuts are available at all times, also when the main menu is not loaded, e.g. during the drag plot mode
• Added auto save
• Added reset plot styles

Version 2.4 

• Added zoom in, zoom out, and zoom to selected
• Slight change in the UI: the graph is a bit larger and the title and the X and Y indicators are now visible all the time, even when the window is made very small.
• Added statistics.
• Added line distance.
• The program is now completely portable if desired.
• Disk space is checked before LastSession file is saved (for USB stick use).
• Load bitmap image, for re-drawing (tracing) data yourself from a scanned image
• A new drawn set displays with connected points while it is being drawn
• Turned snap to plot mode off temporarily when a rectangle is drawn. This speeds up rectangle draw with many plots.
• Added "X is time" flag to the svf format
• The data set style window now allows editing of the graph title name and the X is time flag for each individual plot 
• The selection rectangle now also works for plots in the right Y-axis.

Version 2.3

• Added trace table. Of all plots it displays the Y values belonging to the cursor X value.
• Added drag point. Delete spikes by dragging the individual data points to their place.
• Added Divide Y
• The crosshair cursor, if activated, now follows the mouse cursor continuously.
• Peak area mode now exits with <esc>, instead of <F10>. 

Version 2.2

• Added snap-to-plot reading of the X value and Y value, similar to a cursor trace.
• Envelope. Calculates the minimum and maximum value of all selected plots.
• Added X time format support for multiple columns
• Added X axis time format display (h:m:s instead of just very many seconds)
• Expanded the manual (this document) with a better menu, many sample plots and some source code for programmers.
• Open special format now supports pre-defined X-axis and Y-axis names.
• The data set style window now displays the data file path
• The data set style window allows editing of the the X-axis name and Y-axis name for each individual plot
• Fixed a bug with the graph legend
• Fixed a small bug with the drag plot mode when you couldn't exit the mode if no plot was selected

Version 2.1

• ctrl-click hides a plot instantly
• ctrl-shift-click selects a plot and all the plots originating from the same data file
• Open special format now supports external plug-ins for very complex measure files.
• Pan functionality restored (was deleted in version 2.0): shift-drag drags the whole graph around.

Version 2.0

• Up to 100 levels of undo and redo (default 5)

• The XY value displays (on the top right of the graph) are now continuously updated when the mouse is moved, no need to click on the graph to get a value

• Drag plot. You can pick up a plot by the mouse and drag it to any place you want. A bit easier than manually giving the numeric values with the shift X and shift Y command.

• Copy to clipboard. In order to export the data sets to Excel or similar programs, you had to choose View->Table and then ctrl-a, ctrl-c. With "copy to clipboard" you can skip this step.

• Easier drawing of the zoom rectangle. When you want to draw a rectangle to the edge of the graph, you can go over the edge with the mouse, you don't have to position the mouse exactly on the edge anymore.

• Improved rectangle draw speed when many plots are loaded (60+)

• Many functions now support selecting just a part of a plot by drawing a rectangle before invoking a specific function, like:

• "Delete data points" deletes (discards or interpolates by choice) all the data points within a drawn rectangle. Handy for deleting single spikes from a plot. For data sets with a lot of spikes it is better to choose the "delete large spikes" command in the "smooth" menu.

• Highly improved "delete offset jumps"

• "Draw new data set" works now with dragging, instead of just clicking. Ctrl-Z deletes the last data point(s) you drew, one at a time.

• Resample, define a given number of data points and the program spreads them out over your plot. Might be handy when your data points are not x-equidistant.

• View Trend now can be done manually, with the up and down arrows you can "thumb through" the data sets

• Improved legend, a right-click on a legend name changes it without changing the name in the name window as well

• Drag and drop of measure files into Spectrum Viewer

• Name panel can be docked/attached to the right hand side of the graph panel

• The font of the name panel can now be changed

• The "open special format" settings now include axis names and graph title.

• The maximum number of data sets that can be loaded is now settable, up to 4000, in case any poor guy needs it :-). Set it low for maximum speed, set it high when you need it. The default is 50.

• Some bugs hunted down, squished and eaten... hakuna matata!!

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Version 1.8

• Hidden plots

• Ctrl-a extension: only select the plots within a rectangle

• Select only the plots within a "zooming rectangle"

• Histogram of Y values

• Perform shift Y and multiply Y only on a selected part of a plot

• Save session

• SVF file format

• DDE program control

• Bug fixes

• Several slight changes to make the program more user friendly

Version 1.8.1

• By special request: Normalize Y (in the "Position" menu). You can email me with a special request as well and I'll see if I can implement it.

• The folder history in the "file open" panel is now saved when the program is closed. It used to contain only the folders opened during a particular session, now it contains all folders opened in the past, up to 15 folders

• A minor bug fix that would ask the user a confirmation twice when he wanted to overwrite a file

Version 1.8.2

• Center Y