Wish List for PFE Features

[Rom]

Hi everyone,
could you suggest me how I can change font and text colour for notes on Probe images.
Thank you.

[John Donovan]

Hi everyone,
could you suggest me how I can change font and text colour for notes on Probe images.
Thank you.

If you are asking about the text overlaid on the analog signal images displayed in Probe for EPMA, those cannot be modified at the current time.  Of course one can export the images (both annotated and "raw" images are exported), and annotate the images in any image editing software.

[Rom]

Hi John,
Yes, you are right, I meant the text overlaid the SE and BSE images with markers of the points, where compositions were analysed. The markers, currently used in the Probe for EPMA software are too small and hardly readable when exported to the side applications or software.
If would be great, it the possibility of changing the fonts and colours of these markers and texts will appear.
Thank  you so much.

[John Donovan]

Hi John,
Yes, you are right, I meant the text overlaid the SE and BSE images with markers of the points, where compositions were analysed. The markers, currently used in the Probe for EPMA software are too small and hardly readable when exported to the side applications or software.
If would be great, it the possibility of changing the fonts and colours of these markers and texts will appear.
Thank  you so much.

I will take a look at it as soon as I get a chance.

[Mia Kraft]

Hi John,
Yes, you are right, I meant the text overlaid the SE and BSE images with markers of the points, where compositions were analysed. The markers, currently used in the Probe for EPMA software are too small and hardly readable when exported to the side applications or software.
If would be great, it the possibility of changing the fonts and colours of these markers and texts will appear.
Thank  you so much.

I will take a look at it as soon as I get a chance.

Hi John and Rom,

In preparation for M&M 2021 I have just released the newest version of Probelab ReImager which can handle MBD files.

From version 1.7.5 (released today, actually) you can load PFE MDB projects, just select the directory containing both the MDB and BIM files.
https://reimager.probelab.net

As a side note, Probelab ReImager can open the PFE files on any OS it runs on, this includes Mac. I have had issues with Mac versions older than Catalina (10.15) not always opening MDBs though.

I hope this can help!

[John Donovan]

Hi Mia,

I think we are both too responsive to these "feature wishes"!   

I just finished adding a control for specifying font size for the point labels, but the fact that ReImager can now read images from Probe for EPMA files is wonderful!  Does ReImager read the image scales and plot analysis points and labels for PFE MDB files also?

I'll be uploading this new version in a few hours after everything is re-compiled!

[Mia Kraft]

Hi Mia,

I think we are both too responsive to these "feature wishes"!   

I just finished adding a control for specifying font size for the point labels, but the fact that ReImager can now read images from Probe for EPMA files is wonderful!  Does ReImager read the image scales and plot analysis points and labels for PFE MDB files also?

I'll be uploading this new version in a few hours after everything is re-compiled!

This is actually a feature Anette and I have been finishing over the last couple months, the timing is just right.

All the normal features of ReImager are now supporting PFE, so yes, it reads the scale, points, etc. It can also export any image (Thermo, JEOL) as an ACQ file for PictureSnap App integration.

[John Donovan]

Hi John,
Yes, you are right, I meant the text overlaid the SE and BSE images with markers of the points, where compositions were analysed. The markers, currently used in the Probe for EPMA software are too small and hardly readable when exported to the side applications or software.
If would be great, it the possibility of changing the fonts and colours of these markers and texts will appear.
Thank  you so much.

OK, the latest version of Probe for EPMA (v. 12.9.7) now contains a control for selecting the font size in the saved images dialog for point annotations:



If you want to do more fancy annotations I suggest using Mia Kraft's ProbeLab ReImager software which now supports exporting of Probe for EPMA images for additional editing and annotations:

https://probesoftware.com/smf/index.php?board=38.0

[Anette von der Handt]

Hi John,

Could we add a "display standard image" (maybe not with this many words) button to the confirm standards countdown dialog? I know there is not much space, maybe as an icon?

We can currently display standard images through the digitize dialog but where this function would be really useful is to be able to access them when doing the confirms. Especially as I could annotate the images if certain grains or phases should be avoided.

I would prefer to not have it automatically launch the images as that I would think it would add time to the confirmation process and sometimes I or experienced users just want to spot check whereas new users might want to see the function for all.

Thanks!

[John Donovan]

Hi Anette,
That is a good idea...

For those not familiar with this existing "digitize" feature, it is described here:

https://probesoftware.com/smf/index.php?topic=8.msg1107#msg1107

Interestingly when I started looking closer at the existing code for automatically displaying standard images when digitizing standards, I realized that it wasn't working quite right as intended.

Originally we tried to code this feature so that if one had multiple images (starting with the 4 digit standard number of the standard, e.g., 0012_MgO.bmp, 0358_diopside.bmp, etc., it should display *all* the images starting with that standard number.  However, in fact it only displayed the first matching image that it found in the StandardPOSDirectory as defined in the Probewin.ini file.

The idea being that one might have the same standard in several different mounts, any or all of which could be loaded in the instrument at the same time.  Also one might want to have several different images for each standard, e.g., a low mag image, a high mag image and maybe even some other documentation saved as a BMP image file.

Anyway, that multiple image feature is now fixed and so now when one clicks on the standard in the Digitize window, it loads and displays all the images starting with that standard number. Unless of course the Do Not Display Standard Images checkbox is checked in the Acquisition Options dialog.

Now to your "wish". We added a Load Standard Images button to the Confirm dialog as requested and it behaves the same way as from the Digitize window, *but* because the Digitize window is "modeless" and the Confirm window is "modal", the Digitize windows displays all the standard images at once, while the Confirm dialog displays multiple images (if they exist) one at a time and then each image has to be closed before one can proceed with the position confirmation.

Of course if one only has a single image image for each standard, then it's not a big deal.  Here is what it looks like when confirming standard positions from the Confirm dialog:



Hope this is what you wanted.  Update from the Help | Update Probe for EPMA as usual.

[Rom]

Hi John,
Yes, you are right, I meant the text overlaid the SE and BSE images with markers of the points, where compositions were analysed. The markers, currently used in the Probe for EPMA software are too small and hardly readable when exported to the side applications or software.
If would be great, it the possibility of changing the fonts and colours of these markers and texts will appear.
Thank  you so much.

OK, the latest version of Probe for EPMA (v. 12.9.7) now contains a control for selecting the font size in the saved images dialog for point annotations:

Hi John, it is a good function. Thank you.
How I can change Image name after I create and save it?

[John Donovan]

Easy.

Just double-click the image you want to edit the name of.  Just to remind everyone, if you "hover" your mouse over a control in Probe for EPMA, there usually pops up some further explanation about that control as shown here:



Once you double-click you will see this dialog for editing the image name:

[dawncruth]

Hi John,
Is there a way to label/characterize our monitor samples? Many folks run standards as unknowns as monitors and it would be nice if we could somehow note 1) that they are monitors, and 2) have the software link it back to the reported compositions. It would be useful because right now, we highlight those monitors of interest (e.g. VG-2, or whatever), analyze, and look at the average and do a visual comparison. The feature I envision would load the reported value and then give the summary stats.  I can also see it being useful because then we'd be able to sort by true unknowns and monitors, and then folks who want to look into longer term changes could do that more rapidly. Maybe there is such a feature. If it is present, then please point the way!

Thanks,
Dawn

[John Donovan]

Is there a way to label/characterize our monitor samples? Many folks run standards as unknowns as monitors and it would be nice if we could somehow note 1) that they are monitors, and 2) have the software link it back to the reported compositions. It would be useful because right now, we highlight those monitors of interest (e.g. VG-2, or whatever), analyze, and look at the average and do a visual comparison. The feature I envision would load the reported value and then give the summary stats.  I can also see it being useful because then we'd be able to sort by true unknowns and monitors, and then folks who want to look into longer term changes could do that more rapidly. Maybe there is such a feature. If it is present, then please point the way!

If you have a sample that you want to utilize as a "monitor" sample, I would simply enter it into the standard composition database and then treat it as a secondary standard. That is, don't assign it as a primary standard, but instead simply acquire it along with your other standards.

Then when you go to analyze it quantitatively, it will be treated as though it were an unknown.

[John Donovan]

Hi Anette,
That is a good idea...

For those not familiar with this existing "digitize" feature, it is described here:

https://probesoftware.com/smf/index.php?topic=8.msg1107#msg1107

Interestingly when I started looking closer at the existing code for automatically displaying standard images when digitizing standards, I realized that it wasn't working quite right as intended.

Originally we tried to code this feature so that if one had multiple images (starting with the 4 digit standard number of the standard, e.g., 0012_MgO.bmp, 0358_diopside.bmp, etc., it should display *all* the images starting with that standard number.  However, in fact it only displayed the first matching image that it found in the StandardPOSDirectory as defined in the Probewin.ini file.

The idea being that one might have the same standard in several different mounts, any or all of which could be loaded in the instrument at the same time.  Also one might want to have several different images for each standard, e.g., a low mag image, a high mag image and maybe even some other documentation saved as a BMP image file.

Anyway, that multiple image feature is now fixed and so now when one clicks on the standard in the Digitize window, it loads and displays all the images starting with that standard number. Unless of course the Do Not Display Standard Images checkbox is checked in the Acquisition Options dialog.

Now to your "wish". We added a Load Standard Images button to the Confirm dialog as requested and it behaves the same way as from the Digitize window, *but* because the Digitize window is "modeless" and the Confirm window is "modal", the Digitize windows displays all the standard images at once, while the Confirm dialog displays multiple images (if they exist) one at a time and then each image has to be closed before one can proceed with the position confirmation.

Of course if one only has a single image image for each standard, then it's not a big deal.  Here is what it looks like when confirming standard positions from the Confirm dialog:



Hope this is what you wanted.  Update from the Help | Update Probe for EPMA as usual.

In the latest version of Probe for EPMA we improved this feature to automatically unload any previously loaded standard images when the next standard is clicked on in the Digitize! window.

In this way, you will know that the last standard image you see loaded is for the last standard clicked on. That is, if no standard image is available for that standard, no image will be visible.