ThunderStorm Users Guide

ThunderStorm

by Marco Coïsson
Please note that this application is no longer supported, because of my limited spare time. I cannot guarantee neither future development nor bug fixes. Sorry.

What is it?

ThunderStorm is a data analysis program. It's not supposed to have as many features as commercial programs. It's aim is to give basic tools for manipulating worksheets of data and for plotting and analyzing data.

About version 0.1

Version 0.1 of ThunderStorm is the first public beta release. As the version number suggests, this is a very preliminary release of this app. Most of the features are still missing and many bugs still need to be fixed. This beta version is available for evaluation purposes and for user feedback and bug reports.

New features in version 0.1

Projects can be made by multiple worksheet windows.
Worksheets can contain an arbitrary number of rows and columns.
Columns can be moved and renamed.
Columns can be assigned a formula, and formulae can refer to columns in the same worksheet or in other worksheets.
Automatic update of formulae when columns or worhseets change name.
Import / Export of data from and to ASCII files.

Disclaimer

This software is distributed without any warranty. Use it at your own risk. I'm not responsible of any data loss or damage caused by the use of this software.
This software is in a beta release. Do not use it to manipulate important or vital data. The format of the saved files may change in the future until the final 1.0 release will be available. No backward compatibility with files generated by the various beta releases will be guaranteed.

Licence

ThunderStorm 0.1 is freeware, as all the future beta releases will be. Version 1.0 and following will be donationware.

Known bugs and issues

Line numbers in formulae are not checked for consistency with row limits. If row numbers are provided that are out of range unpredicted behaviour may occur.
Worksheet names, column names and row numbers in formulae must be separated by one and only one blank space. Using multiple blank spaces may result in unexpected behaviour.
Text files used for importing data into worksheet must have rows separated by a carriage return followed by a new line character (typical line ending on the Macintosh platform). Data on the same line must be separated by one and only one blank space. Using more than one blank space or using tabs may result in unpredicted behaviour.
Columns that are functions of other columns are not automatically updated if the columns they are function of are modified.

Features not yet supported

Basic support for data graphics (scatter and lines).
Linear and non linear fits.
Basic statistics.
Localization in other languages.
Notes.
A Math window and global (user-defined) variables.
Anything else that comes to my mind or is suggested by users and I'm able to implement.

These features will be implemented in future beta releases and will all be available in version 1.0 of ThunderStorm.

Using ThunderStorm

Projects

ThunderStorm is organized in projects. When launching ThunderStorm a new project is automatically created. New projects can be created by selecting New from the File menu or by typing command-N. This is the window of an empty project:

You can create new data worksheets by clicking the New Worksheet button on the project window. This version of ThunderStorm does not support Graphics, Math or Notes. New (Worksheet) windows can be renamed by double clicking on their name in the project window. Names cannot contain wihte spaces and any of the following characthers:
()[]{}+-*/=^?!%&@#§
Worksheet names must be unique.

Worksheets

This is a newly created worksheet:

The topmost part of a worksheet window is made by the toolbar, that can be toggled by pressing the button at the top right of the window title bar. The toolbar can be customized by control-clicking on the toolbar and selecting Customize Toolbar... from the context sensitive menu that will pop up. The meaning and behaviour of the buttons in the toolbar will be described in the next paragraphs.
The main part of the worksheet window is constituted by the worksheet itself: it's a table of data organized into columns. Columns can be selected by clicking on their title. Then can me moved (their order can be rearranged) by clicking on their title and dragging to their final position. Rows can be selected but cannot be moved. How to edit data will be described in the next paragraphs. The bottom part of the window is constituted by an empty field that contains the formula assigned to the selected column. If no column is selected, this field is not editable. The Calculate button calculates the selected column with the formula associated to it. The syntax of forulae will be described in the next paragraphs. Formulae are accepted by typing Return or Enter when you have finished typing them in.
Closing a worksheet window does not delete the worksheet, but only hide it. To delete a worksheet window select it from the list in the project window and click the Delete Window button.

Adding and removing columns

Columns can be added and removed by clicking on the Add Column and Delete Column buttons in the toolbar. The Add Column button inserts a new column at the rightmost position in the worksheet. The newly created column can be moved to the desired position by dragging it from its title. To remove a column, you must select it and then click on the Remove Column button in the toolbar. You will be prompted for confirmation. The special column labeled "i" is the index column and contains the row numbers. It can be moved but it cannot be deleted or recalculated.

Changing column names

Column names can be defined by the user by clicking on the Show Drawer button in the toolbar. The worksheet with its drawer open is shown in the following figure:

The selected column can be renamed by typing in the Column Name text field the new name. Column names can contain only alphanumeric characters and must begin with a letter. Column names must be unique within a worksheet. The new typed in name is accepted by pressing Return or Enter when you finish typing.

Adding and removing rows

Rows can be added and removed by pressing the Add/Remove Rows button in the toolbar. A sheet will be displayed asking you how many rows you want to add or remove and where. You can add as many rows as you like. You can remove all the rows in a worksheet if you like.

Inserting data

Data can be inserted into the worksheet in any of the following ways:

Manually: double click on the value you want to edit and type in the new value. Press Return or Enter to confirm. The insertion point moves to the cell below the one you just finished editing. To stop editing cells, select any row or column of the worksheet.
By importing files: click on the Import Data button in the toolbar. You will be prompted to select a text file. No check is made on the file you select: be sure it's a text file. If it's not a text file, unpredicted behaviour may occur. Text files must be organized into new line separated rows (carriage return followed by a new line character is also supported, since it's the default format for text files on the Macintosh platform). Data in a row must be separated by one and only one blank space. Multiple blank spaces or the use of tabs may result in unpredicted behaviour. Columns and rows are added to accommodate all the imported data. Imported data will overwrite any pre-existing data.
By calculating formulae for columns: select a column and type in a formula in the text field at the bottom of the worksheet window. Se a later section for the syntax of formulae. Then click on the Calculate button to calculate values for the selected column. The formula will be calculated for all the rows in the range specified in the Start at row: and End at row: text fields in the drawer (you can open the drawer by clicking on the Show Drawer button in the toolbar). A shortcut to set the Start at row: row number to zero (the first row) and the End at row: row number to the last row is provided by the two min and max buttons at the right of the text fields.

Formulae syntax

Formulae can contain:

Numbers, both with or without the decimal point. Thousand separators must not be used.
Common operators: + for addition, - for subtraction, * for multiplication, / for division and ^ for power. The usual algebraic precedence is followed.
Common functions: sin, cos, tan, asin, acos, atan, sinh, cosh, tanh, asinh, acosh, atanh, mod, ln, log, sqrt, exp. Arguments must be enclosed in parentheses ().
The symbol pi (lowercase) for π.
References to worksheet columns. They must be included in brackets []. The syntax is the following: [<worksheet_name> column_name <row_number>]; items between < and > are optional. The symbols < and > must not be typed. worksheet_name is the name of an available worksheet. Worksheet names are listed in the project window. If the worksheet name is omitted, the name of the worksheet the column whose formula you are editing belongs to is used. column_name is the name of the column you are referencing to. It can either be a column of the same worksheet (in this case worksheet_name is optional) or of another available worksheet. row_number is the row number you want to refer to. If it's not specified, the number of the currently calculated row is used. Note that row_number must be a number and not a reference. Note also that one and only one blank space must be used between any of the arguments between brackets and that no blank space must be inserted after the open bracket [ and before the closed bracket ].

Examples

[i]+1	Suppose this formula is associated to column Alice: . Then, each row of column Alice will be assigned a value that is equal to the value of the corresponding row of column i (the index column) of the same worksheet plus one.
[i 5]+1	Suppose this formula is associated to column Alice: . Then, each row of column Alice will be associated a value that is equal to row number 5 of column i (the index column) of the same worksheet plus one. Since rows are counted from zero, row number 5 of the index column is actually the sixth row and has a value of 5. So the result is 6 for all values of Alice.
[Jupiter Alice]	Each row of the column this formula belongs to is associated a value corresponding to the value of the same row of column Alice of worksheet Jupiter. Note that column Alice of worksheet Jupiter must have enough rows.
[Jupiter Alice 21]	Each row of the column this formula belongs to is associated a value corresponding to row number 21 of column Alice of worksheet Jupiter.
sin(pi*[i])+[i]/2	This is a more complex formula. See the result in this figure:

Exporting data

To save the data of a worksheet to a text file, click the Export Data button in the toolbar. You will be prompted for a file name. The extension is .dat. Data are exported as a blank space separated table. Lines are separated by newline characters.

Saving to disk and retreiving saved files

You can save projects together with all their windows (presently only worksheets) to files by selecting Save from the File menu or by typing command-S. Note that the worksheet window must be the frontmost in order for this command to work. Similarly, you can open saved files by selecting Open... from the File menu or by typing command-O.

Getting ThunderStorm

ThunderStorm can be downloaded from here.

Getting other MacOSX software

You can get other MacOS X software written by myself.

Thank you for trying ThunderStorm.