Plot Line Measurements

The Plot Line Measurements tool marks lines in a Plot Window. Although the lines may be drawn at any angle to get the starting and ending coordinates, perhaps the most interesting application is drawing with the SHIFT key to assure that only a perfectly horizontal or vertical line is drawn parallel to the x-axis or y-axis.

The commands in the line plotting package originate in a docking pane toolbar that may be opened, closed, and tabified. The plot series and line coordinates are accrued in the Lines grid pane for the plot window. The toolbar opens with Marking Mode active. Marker properties are set in the Marker Properties dialog opened from the button on the toolbar. To disable the active marking mode, use the arrow button at the bottom of the pane.

To activate the Line Measurements toolbar, click on the Image Measurements Toolbar or the Plot Bar, or use the command in the pull-down main menu for Plot Windows.

The following picture shows a Plot Window with a line marking the (x,y) coordinates of two peaks. Measurement results accrue in the Lines Docking Pane which opens at the bottom of the window.

The line drawn in the picture above created a Lines measurements pane and added the measurement to it. The SHIFT key was held during measurement to assure that the line was drawn completely horizontal to measure the true distance along the x axis.

Tip	To draw a line only along multiples of 90 degrees (horizontal or vertical), press the SHIFT key and hold it before starting to draw. Do not release the SHIFT key until after releasing the mouse button at the end of the line.

Procedure

Adjust the plot to the desired scale, showing the region to measure.
Click the button on the Image Plot Toolbar or use the Plot > Line Profile Toolbar menu command to open the toolbar. Marking mode is automatically enabled when the toolbar is first opened. To reactivate it, click at the top of the Plot Lines Toolbar.
Move the mouse to the starting point. Press and hold down the left mouse button.
- To draw a line only in multiples of 90 degrees, press the SHIFT key and hold it before starting to draw. Do not release the SHIFT key until after releasing the mouse button at the end of the line.
With the left button down, drag the mouse pointer to the endpoint and release the button. The results are reported in the Lines docking pane of the Plot Window.
To mark other lines, repeat steps 3 and 4.
When finished drawing lines, you can disable marking mode by clicking on the toolbar.

Measurement Results

The line data are tabulated in the Lines grid like the one shown above. This is a Docking Pane that attaches initially to the bottom border of the Plot Window but may be moved, tabified, and so on. The results listed in the grid may be sorted, rearranged, saved to the clipboard or a file, and so on. The items in this report are described below.

Line Measurements

#	The sequence number of the line in its series.
Plot	The title of the plot.
Index	The sequence number of the line measurement
Distance	The distance between the beginning and ending points.
X1	The X coordinate of the starting point.
Y1	The Y coordinate of the starting point.
X2	The X coordinate of the ending point.
Y2	The Y coordinate of the ending point.
Notes	Space to add comments about the measurements. These will be included if you export the table to a text file.

Procedure

Measurement Results

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