2. First Steps — ViTables Users' Guide v2.1 documentation

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# 2. First Steps

In this chapter we are going to describe briefly the main elements that you will meet throughout your working sessions.

## 2.1. How to Start

Usually ViTables is started by running the vitables program under X (from a terminal emulator or directly from your desktop). If you are using a terminal then you can give some arguments to the command line

Currently command line arguments are available only in Linux platforms. You can get the available arguments by issuing the command:

    $ vitables --help
    $ usage: vitables \[options] \[h5file]
    options:
    --version             show program's version number and exit
    -h, --help            show this help message and exit
    -mMODE, --mode=MODE   mode access for a database
    -dh5list, --dblist=h5list
    a file with the list of databases to be open

Basically you can specify a file to open or a file containing a list of files to open. For example:

    $ vitables myh5file

will start ViTables and open the file myh5file in read-write mode. If you want to open it in read-only mode then execute the command:

    $ vitables -m r myh5file

In order to open a set of files at once put them in a list file with the syntax

    mode path

(one pair per line) and execute:

    $ vitables -d h5list

Once the application is running the main window appears. It consists of a menu bar, a set of tool bars, a viewing area and a status bar.

The viewing area of the window is divided into three parts. The tree of databases viewer is the narrow region placed at top left side. It will display a tree representation of the data hierarchies we want to access. The big panel next to the tree viewer is called the workspace, and will display the real data contained in a given node of the data hierarchy. Finally, the bottom region is the logger, a kind of text non interactive console where information about your requested operations will be shown.

As usual, you can launch commands from the menu bar, from context menus or, if a shortcut button is available, from a toolbar. Also keyboard shortcuts are available for most commands.

After starting your session, you are likely to open some files. Just drag the file(s) you want to open into the tree of databases viewer and they will be opened in read-write mode. Opening can be done from the file manager dialog too; simply issue an open command, File ‣ Open File (`Ctrl-O`) and choose a file.

The main window

## 2.2. The Menu Bar

The menu bar is placed at top of the main window. It is composed of six pulldown menus.

File menu

This menu contains commands to manipulate files in several ways: open, close, create, save and so on. It also gives to you quick access to the most recently opened files.

Node menu

The Node menu contains commands to manipulate the nodes displayed in the tree of databases viewer. From this menu you can edit nodes in a variety of ways as well as access their properties.

Dataset menu

With this menu you can make selects in any table (the result of your selects will be available under the Query Results node in the tree pane). The number of entries for this menu depends on the list of enabled plugins.

Settings menu

This is the menu from which the application can be customized. Customization includes startup behavior, look and feel and plugins management. You can add/remove paths for loading plugins, enable and disable plugins. Changes in the enabled/disabled status of a given plugin take effect after restarting ViTables. See the ViTables Configuration chapter for more information on this subject.

Also from this menu you can show, hide and line up the application toolbars. At the moment four toolbars are available, File, Node, Query and Help.

Window menu

The Window menu can be used to change the arrangement of the workspace contents, sorting the open windows as a cascade or as a tile. By selecting a window name from this menu, you can raise (bring to the front) that window. Any open window can be closed from this menu.

Help menu

The Help menu displays this User’s Guide in HTML4 format and a couple of About boxes, one for the ViTables itself and one for the underlying Qt libraries. The Show Versions entry shows the version numbers of the libraries being used by ViTables (Qt, PyQt, PyTables and PyTables related libraries, like Zlib or LZO). Finally, from this menu you can enter the What’s This mode which will show context help for the components of the viewing area (the databases tree viewer, the workspace and the logger).

## 2.3. The Viewing Area

As mentioned before, the viewing area is divided into three regions: the databases tree viewer (also called tree pane), the workspace and the logger. Now we are going to describe these regions in more detail.

### 2.3.1. The Databases Tree Viewer

Due to the hierarchical model of the underlying HDF5 library, PyTables files store their data on disk in a tree-like structure. Every time you open a PyTables file, its so-called object tree (a representation of the data hierarchy) is dynamically created and added to the tree of databases viewer, at the top left side of the viewing area (see the main window Figure).

Note

since PyTables-1.2 the object tree of an opened file is made on demand: nodes are added to the tree when they are accessed. ViTables makes use of this feature, which results in stunningly fast opening times for files with a large number of nodes.

Any object tree is made of nodes which can be classified as follows:

Root node
  It is the node from which all other nodes hang.
Groups
  Groups are nodes that can contain other nodes.
Leaves
  Leaves are nodes that contain real data. They can be tables or arrays.

Working with object trees is really easy. By double-clicking on it, a root node is opened, and the tree structure below it is displayed. Groups are presented as folders. They can be expanded with a double-click, giving you immediate access to their contents. A group can contain groups and/or leaves (or may be empty). A double click on a leaf will display its content on the workspace. You can access the available options for a given node just with a right mouse click on it. A context menu will appear from which commands can be launched. The contents of the menu depend on the kind of node being clicked (root nodes, groups, tables and arrays have all of them their own context menu). Alternatively you can select the node with a single mouse click and choose a command from the Node menu. There is also a context menu for the tree pane itself that will pop up by right-clicking any empty area of the tree viewer. Last but not least, the object tree can be navigated with the keyboard too. Pressing the Enter key the selected node will be expanded (if it is a group) or opened (if it is a leaf). The + and - keys expand an collapse groups.

Every node in a given object tree has an associated icon that allows you to identify its type quickly. The following icons are available:

The node symbols

### 2.3.2. The Workspace

At this point you should have one or more files opened, and their object trees displayed in the databases tree viewer. Your next step will be to select a leaf and display its data. Remember that the object tree imitates the structure on disk, which makes it very easy to browse the hierarchy of the file and locate the leaf you want to open.

A double-click on a leaf of your choice will open it and display its contents in a window (a view in the ViTables jargon) placed in the workspace, the big panel at the top right side of the viewing area (see the main window Figure).

Note that the databases tree viewer and the workspace are always synchronized: if you select a node in the tree viewer and that node has a view, then that view becomes the active view on the workspace. The opposite is also true, click on a view on the workspace and its node will be automatically selected on the databases tree viewer.

The Window pulldown menu provides some additional commands that will help you to manage your views. From this menu you can, for instance, rearrange views, see the list of views (which is particularly useful when the workspace is cluttered with so many views that it’s difficult to find the one you want) or close all the views at once.

There is also a context menu for the workspace. It can be used to change the workspace view mode: you can display views as regular windows (default behavior) or with tabs in a tab bar. In addition it give you access to the Window pulldown menu.

### 2.3.3. The Logger

The logger is a read-only (i.e. non interactive) console placed at the bottom of the viewing area (see the main window Figure). It is an info panel where ViTables reports the result of requested operations (namely if they were not successful). Also runtime errors are caught and reported to you through the logger (so you can mail the error to ViTables developers and help to improve the quality of the package :-). Errors and warning messages are highlighted in red and orange respectively.

Of course there is also a context menu for the logger that provides you with some handy operations, like to copy selected text or to empty the logger.

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