About Oscilloscope (0.5.15)

I'm still working on this oscillospone and there are a few things i'm not sure how to solve:

- About the controls.

Currently the Oscilloscope have a single set of controls for time and voltage.
There are buttons at the top to select to wich channel the controls are tied: channel 1, 2 or both.
To edit values values for one channel you must select it first, do changes, then select other, do changes.. etc:



This has some advantages:
- It takes minimal space.
- Addding more channels would be easy, just adding more buttons.

But using it i get confused many times and change the channel that i don't want.
That is why i have been experimenting with a full set of controls, with dials and boxes for each channel. For example:





This takes much more space and even more with more channels. But you can acess directly exactly the control you want without losing time changing channel.

I would like to know your opinions and suggestions about this issue.


- About Oscilloscope as a component or a widget.

Being a component inside the circuit, the Oscilloscope must have a size in pixels.
This causes problems for some screen resolutions and/or Operating Systems.

Ideally the widget containing the controls should be free to resize itself to fit it's content. So a floating widget would be more adecuate.
Another advantage of this aproach is that this widget can be placed anywhere in the screen.

What is your take about this?

A third option would be to have the Oscilloscope screen in the circuit and the controls as a floating widget.
This has the advantage that both can be optimal in size.
You can rezize the Oscope screen to one size and the controls to another size depending on what you need.
In the "one-pieze" Oscilloscope both sizes are tied and one contrains the other.

Imagine you have the oscilloscope in the circuit without controls, and in any moment you can click a button and open the controls as a widget, something like this:



Or this:



I am a bit lost in diferent options and good/bad things for each one.

What do you think?
Any other option to add?

In my opinion, current approach is adequate. In fact, real oscilloscopes already should share time knob.

The last proposal (floating panel with control knobs) seems also interesting. When adjusted, there are no longer needed (and hiding them will save a lot of space). Of course, selected s/div and V/div should remain visible on screen.

Best regards.

I like to see a "more realistic" way of the knobs. Therefore, the large knobs and horizontal order of time and voltages would be great.

A floating scope (=widget) seems good.

• The connections would then be done via probes, right? Or might there be another connector component in the circuit? (Or special "tunnels"?)
  
• Will the settings (including size and position) then also be stored in the simu file?
  

Another idea could be an instrument "shelf" - similar to the serial monitor in older versions. Best would be to give the user the choice (like window layout in eclipse) - but this might be a bit to far away   ..

I also think that one time knob is enough for 99% of the simulations. Maybe the individual timing could be activated via the component properties, when needed.

Auto-hide for the knobs sounds also great.

TimFisch wrote:I like to see a "more realistic" way of the knobs. Therefore, the large knobs and horizontal order of time and voltages would be great.

The issue about knobs size is space... if the oscope takes half of the screen, then it becomes dificult to interact with the circuit.
Sometimes you might want to see only the oscope, but sometimes you want to play with the circuit and see the changes in the oscope screen at same time.
Sometimes you might want to have several oscopes at the same time.

acebrian wrote:The last proposal (floating panel with control knobs) seems also interesting. When adjusted, there are no longer needed (and hiding them will save a lot of space).

TimFisch wrote:A floating scope (=widget) seems good.
...
Auto-hide for the knobs sounds also great.

This is also related with knob sizes.
An only-controls widget would be resizable:



In one side it feels weird having the controls separated from the screen, but it has some advantages.
For example knobs over the screen and other appearamce problems would be solved:

TimFish wrote:The connections would then be done via probes, right? Or might there be another connector component in the circuit? (Or special "tunnels"?)

Tunnels are much more adecuate than probes, they already sove the connection mechanism. Connecting to probes is much more complicated.

But here are several options as well:
- One is separated screnn / controls, like in the video above.
- Another is the whole oscope as a widget and using tunnels to connect.
- Or it cold be like in Proteus, with a component for connection and a floating widget for the whole oscope.

TimFish wrote:Will the settings (including size and position) then also be stored in the simu file?

Yes, that is mandatory.

TimFish wrote:Another idea could be an instrument "shelf" - similar to the serial monitor in older versions. Best would be to give the user the choice (like window layout in eclipse) - but this might be a bit to far away

That was the first implementation.
Everything was in a bottom panel: serial monitor, plotter and oscope.
The problem is that it was limited to only one oscope.
Currently you can add as many oscopes as you want in diferent places in the circuit.

Or it cold be like in Proteus, with a component for connection and a floating widget for the whole oscope.

I think this way would be more practical. Sometimes the circuit can be very large, and a floating widget with the screen + controls would be great for monitoring changes when interacting with different components.

Maybe the widget could have a button to collapse/expand the controls, since they are not needed every time.

wallysalami wrote:

Or it cold be like in Proteus, with a component for connection and a floating widget for the whole oscope.

I think this way would be more practical. Sometimes the circuit can be very large, and a floating widget with the screen + controls would be great for monitoring changes when interacting with different components.

Maybe the widget could have a button to collapse/expand the controls, since they are not needed every time.

Yes, you are right.
In some cases having an oscope as a component can be a limitation.
A floating widget with the complete oscilloscope looks the best option.

Next oscope version is almost finished.
Better watch it than explain:

It looks great! Is ist possible to have some main control like time/voltage zoome on the mouse wheel and / or left  / right click event?

Other data-acquisition software (e.g. Open Source Sigrok PulseView or Closed Source Saleae Logic) use this in such a way.

Is ist possible to have some main control like time/voltage zoome on the mouse wheel and / or left / right click event?

It should be possible.
I will have a look.

This is the Oscilloscope in it's current state.
I think most of the issues are addressed.

Now it can actually be used as an Oscope and as a replacement for the old Plotter.

This one will be available in version 0.4.15-SR1.
This version will be public in a few days as an "emergency" replacement for 0.4.15-Final, which had a few important problems, one of then critical.

Great! It looks like it could substitute my real scope in the lab for virtual lab sessions!