Vis_Alpha
This tool can be accessed in most data- windows by bringing up the context menu (right-click) and select the view/Alpha option.
An early design consideration was that by default, r, g and b channels in the sampled sensor data should contain actual byte- values and reserve the use of the alpha channel for metadata.
The contents of the alpha channel depends on the sensor used as source and what meta-data mode has been set. The current options are available:
- None (Fullbright)
- Delta Distance - The difference against last update
- Entropy - (with varying block sizes)
- Pattern Signal - Programmable low-level byte sequences
The delta distance feature is primarily useful for polling sources, like the mem-sense with a refresh clock. The screenshot below shows the alpha window picking up on a changing byte sequence that would be hard to spot with other settings.
Future uses for the alpha channel will be to signify logical data groups, e.g. transfer sizes in file operations.