Data Column

A data column is a chronological series of measurements of a particular variable over many time steps. For brevity, the Windographer user interface and this help file sometimes use the term 'column' to mean 'data column'. One or more data columns comprise a data frame.

If a data logger records the wind speed at 75m and the wind direction at 72m every ten minutes, for example, then the resulting data frame will contain two data columns, one containing the wind speed measurements and one containing the wind direction measurements.

If we represented that data frame in a tabular format, with one row for each time step and one column for each of the two variables recorded, then a data column would correspond to one column of that table. In the example below, the data column named 'Speed 75m' appears highlighted:

Start Time	Speed 75m	Direction 72m
Start Time	(m/s)	(°)
2021-02-12 05:40	8.10	287
2021-02-12 05:50	8.14	268
2021-02-12 06:00	7.53	250
2021-02-12 06:10	7.45	236
2021-02-12 06:20	6.49	232
2021-02-12 06:30	5.43	225
2021-02-12 06:40	4.81	222
2021-02-12 06:50	4.57	225
2021-02-12 07:00	4.84	223
2021-02-12 07:10	4.65	219
2021-02-12 07:20	4.65	218
2021-02-12 07:30	4.98	217
2021-02-12 07:40	5.24	227
2021-02-12 07:50	5.62	264

Windographer can open and display datasets ranging from a single data column to hundreds of data columns. A dataset may contain both static data columns and calculated data columns, meaning ones calculated from the values in other data columns. Windographer groups related data columns (e.g. the mean, min, max, and standard deviation of 60m wind speed) into data channels. See the links below for further explanation.