Time Series Graphing

Many of the plotting features of EFDC_Explorer use the Time Series Graphing (TSG) utility. In addition to time series plotting, the TSG is also used for any XY plot as well as ViewSlice (but with a completely different plotting subroutine). Figure 1 shows a screen capture of the TSG. This figure demonstrates the capability of the TSG to import multiple data files for comparison with model results.

Figure 1 Time Series Plot.

Most of the functionality of the TSG is provided in the toolbar at the top of the utility but some of the functionality is accessed via keystrokes by press F2 (see Figure 2).

Table 1 provides a brief summary of the toolbar functions. This is very similar to the ViewSlice toolbar. The main difference is the import (I<-) and export (E->) data series features. These are extremely useful to save a data series out to a file, and then later, when viewing another model or other series, load that series in for comparison. The format of these files is shown in Appendix B. A "DAT" file (the default extension) can contain an almost unlimited series. Since the TSG is used to view every time series from water column to sediments and boundary forcing series, the user can develop their own series from data for calibration or any other comparison purposes.

Exporting: When exporting, the TSG exports only the data in the current view. If data has been loaded but "turned off" that data will not be exported. The legend is exported with each series.

Importing: The TSG utility first requests a file to import. It then loads all the lines in the file and displays them with the legend and asks the user which series to import. Once the series to be imported is selected, the user is then asked which series to insert the imported series into. The TSP makes an initial series assignment but the user can select any series from 1 to 10. Existing series can be overwritten during the import process, if desired.

The left (primary) and right (secondary) Y axes can be edited by using the toolbar buttons shown in Table 1 or they can be edited by RMC'ing on the areas of the axis labels. The same method applies to access to the X-axis editor.

Figure 2 TSP Utility keystroke functions.

Table 1 Summary of Time Series Graphing Utility toolbar.