software . lter.limnology.wisc.edu

The ways you count and measure in Z3 have not really been changed; they just have never been fully explained. There have been slight changes to enable Individuals to work correctly. Also, Hotkeys really do work now.

The change: If you click on an old data point to edit or delete it, Z3 will re-open that Individual and let you add more measurements to it. If you then add an Egg Count, it will associate it with the individual you clicked on.

I know, that's not a huge change, but it could affect you. It also encouraged me to describe completely how the Counting and Measuring interactions work in Z3.

In some order, you've opened your Workspace, calibrated the display, created a new Data Set, picked a Species, chosen a measurement type, and clicked Start Counting. Now what do you do? Here is the COMPLETE list of Counting/Measuring Interactions.

Left-Click to Count. This creates a new Individual with one measurement, with the value Count=1.

Right-Click then Left-Click to Measure a Length. This creates a new Individual, with a Count=1 and a Length that you just measured. To measure a length using multiple points, right-click as many times as needed then left-click to finish the length measurement.

Press Period (.) to bring up the "Edit Data Point" screen to modify the last data point added. You can also select an individual in the Data window, then press Period to edit that individual.

Press Esc to close the current individual.

Press a Hotkey to Select and Count the associated Countable/Species. If you need to measure the individual, you will also have to delete the Count generated by the hotkey.

Those are the most basic interactions, and they have not changed since Z2. How do you take other kinds of measurements? How do you work with Individuals? What do Hotkeys do?

When you Count or Measure, a new Individual is created. You can see in the status bar that this Individual stays Open until you press Escape or make a new one (by counting or measuring).

Egg Counts. If you want to add an additional measurement, like an Egg Count:
* Drop-down the measurement type to Egg Count, and click once for each egg you're counting. Then drop-down back to Length.
* Or, drop-down to Egg Count, click Once to add an Egg Count value, press the Period Key to go to Edit Data Point, and type in the egg count manually. Then drop-down back to Length.
* Or, press the Egg Count hotkey, the tilde key, once to select Egg Count. Then press the Period Key and type in the egg count. On closing the Edit Data Point, the measurement type will revert back to Length.

If you want to add an Egg Count to a previous individual (presumably so that you can associate it with the length) you can click on a length or count in the data points display, this will "Open" that Individual, and then add an Egg Count as described above. It will be associated with the same Individual ID shown for the data point you clicked.

Hotkeys. You can set a hotkey for certain Countables. Right-click the Countable, select Assign Hotkey, and record the desired hotkey or hotkey combination. Now, once you Start Counting, if you ever hit that key, Z3 will SELECT and COUNT that countable.

As an aside, why does Measuring a Length create a new individual rather than adding the Length to the last individual? Because that's how it has always worked. Presumably, to make it go faster. Z2 combined the ideas of Counting, Individuals, and Measuring by representing a Count as an Individual with a Length of 0. To preserve that behavior, the Sample Schema for Z3 says that every Individual should have a Count, if you count twice in a row it shouldn't increment the count for the last individual (like Egg Count does) but it should create a new individual entirely. It also specifies that taking a Length implies adding a Count, so when you measure a length, Z3 adds a Count; seeing that the currently selected individual already has a Count, it decides to create a new one. Just a different process to arrive at the same end. Formalizing this concept at the Schema level allows new schemas to be created that enforce their own counting/measuring style, while preserving our own interaction style from Z2 and before.