Chesapeake Times, Vol 15 | October 2023
A few places in the program, you will run across some value, set by default, to start the process. Overriding these values is easy, simply put in the number you wish to use. But if you are changing the value every time, perhaps the default value needs to be updated. We looked at programs within SonarWiz, where these settings show up when the program is launched, and decided if they were appropriate. Perhaps years ago, they made sense – but as sonar systems changed, these values should also be updated.
The first one I had changed was the angle bounds in the Patch Test. Better installations and higher accuracy sensors made the original default values a bit too broad. So instead of now using -10 to 10 degrees and the start and stop values, this is now changed to -3 to 3, as a default. The operator can still override this value, but now the default is something that makes a bit more sense and is in the realm of what can be expected from the results.
Another change is the band pass filter when processing sub bottom data. The default taps are now set to 500. Using 50 might have worked a while back, but this value seemed to always be too low, and clients changed it to a higher value. We also updated the EGN table creation for sidescan processing and made a simple change – added a default table name, allowing you to build a table without always needing to type in a file name.
Certainly, all these are small items – and by programmer definition, not a bug. However, getting the user a default value that makes sense and is a better representation of the actual value to be used, is a change made in SonarWiz 7.12.0.
I’m certain there are others that should be changed. If you run across one that you are constantly changing the default value, let me know. We’ll get that update too.