Visualization – 3D viewer

The 3D viewer provides a menu bar at the top which can change the appearance of the viewer, and a menu bar on the right side which is responsible for the resolution of the viewer. The view on the plane can be changed when the mouse is clicked inside the drawing canvas.

Top menu bar:

- Stretch time/int./m/z: The 3D viewer itself treats every dimension equally, so that every dimension should have the same length. However, for the chromatography it makes more sense to stretch the time axis. Thus, the “stretch time” is automatically set to 2.0. Any of the three dimensions can be stretched or shrunk with these three input fields. The settings are applied after the “Update” button has been pressed.
 
- Show Light: The 3D viewer has a light source falling on the plane, resulting in bright or shadowy spots. The light effects can be switched off with this check box.
 
- Show Texture: In order to give the picture more contrast a texture is rendered over the plane. The texture can be turned off with this check box.
 
- Selected: If selected, the quantified and stored peaks are colored in read; the ones that are just quantified and not stored are colored in green. If not selected, the coloring depends on the signal intensity (green: low intensity; yellow: medium intensity; red high intensity).
 
- 2D-Position: This shows the stripe that has been taken to extract the chromatogram in gold.

Right menu bar:

- t: Is the time resolution in seconds.
 
- m/z: Is the m/z resolution in Daltons.
 
- Add res.: The viewer has the ability to change the resolution level depending on how close the view is on the plane. Several resolution levels can be entered. If an additional resolution level is required just press this button. The point where the resolution is changed is defined by the d field.
 
- d: Is the distance field; it appears if several resolution levels are set. The distance is always measured from the center of the plane. 1 corresponds to a total distance of the m/z axis to the center of the plane. This value is rather empirical, but due to general applicability to different resolutions this approach had been chosen.
 
- Rem res.: Removes a resolution level
 
- Update: This button has to be pressed when the resolution settings should take effect for the 3D view.

Mouse buttons:

- Left mouse button: Changes the viewing angle on the canvas.
 
- Middle mouse button: Zooming in and out.
 
- Right mouse button: Moving the plane.