Introduction to NI DIAdem

Overview

NI DIAdem is a comprehensive software application designed to import, organize, and both visually and numerically analyze measurement data.   It is a complete solution for the management of Big Data.

DIAdem DataPlugin technology allows you to directly import raw data files from over 200 data acquisition / data logger file formats.   Additionally, it allows you to create a custom DataPlugin to import text/CSV based files via a simple to use Wizard.   An advanced DIAdem user may also create a new DataPlugin to read any binary file format where the structure of the file is known.  

Measurement data sizes can get large, and consist of many individual files.   In some data acquisition scenarios, you may have data recorded by different data acquisition devices and/or data loggers during the same session, or between current and earlier activities.   The best way to manage this Big Data is to import it, convert it to a consistent data model, and then save it to a binary file.  

NI provides an open format binary file that has superior performance and flexibility for the storage of measurement data.   Converting raw measurement data files to the NI TDM/TDMS file format, and then analyzing data in that format with DIAdem, will significantly reduce the time to read files, analyze them, and then save the results.   (see Excel for Big Data and Database vs. File for more information).  

DIAdem Vs. Excel & Other Apps

It is fairly easy to import CSV and other text based data formats into spreadsheet applications such as Excel.   Each parsed data can be assigned a column in the spreadsheet, and you can then perform calculations on the data in all rows within a column.   This works well for small files, but quickly becomes a burden with more than 100,000 rows, and impossible at more than 1,048,576 rows of data.   Reading 1 million rows in Excel takes minutes, but reading it with a DIAdem DataPlugin will only take 7 seconds.   Saving the data to a binary (TDM/TDMS) file and then reading it again will only take 0.04 seconds with DIAdem.  

Most DIAdem DataPlugins have been optimized to read raw data as fast as possible.   And few other time series data analysis applications support anything near the number of raw data formats DIAdem supports.   If you are truly dealing with Big Data, and you need to be able to analyze data from a wide range of data acquisition systems and data loggers, consider carefully the import capabilities and performance of your data analysis system.  

DIAdem Graphical User Interface

The DIAdem graphical user interface (GUI) is organized by task.   The Navigator panel allows you to import raw data, connect to an indexing service such as DataFinder, and to search for data.   The Data Portal provides a means to interact with imported data that has been loaded into memory.   The View panel has tools to enable you to visually analyze and interact with data loaded into the Data Portal.   The Analysis panel provides hundreds of engineering and scientific analysis functions for the manipulation, calculation, and analysis of data.   The Report panel has a powerful user interface that quickly generates custom visualizations of the analyzed data, and supports exporting report pages to common external document formats.   The Script panel allows you to automate repetitive tasks.  

The DIAem panels are highlighted in red in the image below.   When you select a panel, the user interface area (highlighted in blue) changes, presenting new menu choices, group bars (and their function groups), and toolbars that are relevent to the panel (task) chosen.

DIAdem Settings

The global settings for DIAdem are accessible by accessing the menu option 'Settings', 'DIAdem Settings...' from any panel.   This will launch a dialog 'DIAdem Settings' with the options organized within a 'General' group, and then by 'Panels'.   Any changes to the settings will not persist to the next launch of DIAdem unless you save them.  

DIAdem settings may be saved by accessing the menu 'Settings', 'Save As...'.   A 'Save DIAdem Settings As' dialog will appear and it will be set by default to the folder location where DIAdem expects to find the settings file with the '.DDD' file extension.   The default DIAdem settings file is named 'Desktop.DDD'.   Any alternative settings you wish to save should be saved in this folder, under a different filename.  

Loading a .DDD settings file after DIAdem has been loaded will cause DIAdem to restart.   You may also launch DIAdem with a particular settings (.DDD) file.   By specifying a startup script in the 'DIAdem Settings' dialog under 'General', 'Start script', and saving those settings to a unique settings '.DDD' file, you can cause DIAdem to automatically launch a custom script.   To do this, make a copy of the Windows menu icon, then edit the icon and modify the 'Target:' option to include the custom desktop filename with the lower case letter 'd' as the prefix followed by the desktop settings filename without the filename extension.   For example, to launch a custom desktop file named 'CustomDesktop.DDD', the command line would be modified to add 'dCustomDesktop' as: "C:\Program Files\National Instruments\DIAdem 2021\DIAdem.exe" /dCustomDesktop   Note that the double quotes " are required for the path because it has spaces in it.  

What You Learned

• DIAdem is a Big Data management software application that excels in the ingestion, analysis, and visualization of 2D and 3D measurement data.  
• You can import Big Data from nearly any file format, and then store it to an efficient, open file format.
• The graphical user interface is organized by task (import, search, visualize, analyze, report, automate), and the user interface changes based on the panel selected.  
• The global settings can be saved and loaded, and also configured to run a custom script when DIAdem is launched.