This tutorial provides a general overview of the application files as well as introduction into the most common user operations which can be done in the program.
How DelftShell files are organized?
The DelftShell application consists of the 2 main parts, Main Application and a set of the Plugins.
Tip:
In order to start the application go to the DelftShell-1.0.5546 folder (a folder you get after downloading and uncompressing the program) and then start DelftShell.Loader.exe.
It will start an application and will show a screen like the one below.
The mail graphical user interface is organized as a set of tool windows and document windows. A main difference between those two is that the tool windows are always shown on a screen and document windows - only to visualize or edit a specific data type.
A typical examples of the Tool Windows are:
- Project Explorer - a main navigation window showing all data contained in the current project in a tree-like form.
- Message Window - logging windows, messages sent from models or different parts of the system are placed here.
- Property Grid - shows properties for an active selection of the graphical user interface.
- Toolbox - user-specific data shared between different projects (not fully implemented yet).
- Maps - tree-like window showing list of the GIS layers in the currently opened map.
- Time Series Navigator - allows to navigate through times of any time-dependent data.
- Network - allows to view / edit structure of the currently opened (hydro) network.
When application is started - it automatically creates a default empty project so that user can immediately start filling it in with a various data, models, etc. Project can be seen as a currently opened user work document. Currently project can be stored in SQLite database file format. Eventually DelftShell may store a model input / output data in a set of NetCDF files located next to the project file. So in total there are two non-proprietary file formats used to store project data.
Tip:
Use F2 in Project Explorer in order to edit name of the project, folder, model or any other item contained.
Generally speaking in default configuration DelftShell can store the following data types in the project:
- Folder
- Model / Composite Model - working activities which user can start in order to perform a computations
- Data - any data type registered in the system, default contain e.g. Time Series, Regular Grid Coverage or more specific data types such as Network.
- <specific application documents such as Map or Chart> - these are non-data objects but more views configured in order to view those objects.
How do I add a new Time Series or any other data type to the project.
Use a menu command shown on the screen below.
After that a dialog will appear showing a list of a data types currently supported by the application.
Note that Network (hydro network) is also considered as one of the supported data types. Actually an architecture of the system allows easy implementation of the user-specific data types, but this is a more advanced topic and will be covered in a Developers Guide.
How do I add a new computational model, e.g. Delft Flow Model 1D, to the project
Adding models to the project works pretty the same as with a data. User has to select a model type via Project (right-click) > Add > New Model ....
This is how it looks after demo 1D flow model is added to the project:
All model input and output data can be navigated via Project Explorer tree view.
Tip:
When model is selected in the project explorer you can define run time parameters of the model via Property Grid:
Actually many parameters, not only for model, can be viewed or edited via Property Grid when they are selected in the different windows.
How data added to the project can be edited?
Graphical user interface supports different data types and most of them currently have a default editor. Usually editor opens automatically when data / model is added to the project. But when it is closed - user may re-open it with a double click.
In some specific cases there may be more than two editors / viewers registered for one data type - in this case gui will show a selection dialog where user may select a default type of the editor. View type selection dialog maybe reactivated by right-clicking on selected item in the Project Explorer and then selecting Open With ....
Tip:
When any of the Tool Windows is closed, in order to bring it back use View menu, e.g. View > Project Explorer. This will re-add it back in the main gui.
Tip:
When gui exits - it automatically saves all its settings data, including all tool windows layot, into the user custom settings file which is usually located in a directory: *C:\Document and Settings\<user name>\Local Settings\Application Data\Deltares\DelftShell*. Check it to see which files are saved there. You can also remove the whole Deltares\DelftShell directory e.g. if you'd like to reset all user-specific settings
How get my data into the project or export it into a different file format?
When
