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	Aabel 3 Overview Statistics & Multivariate Data Analysis Interactive Visualization & Scientific Graphing Thematic Maps & Map Projection Utilities Dynamic Data Exploration Worksheets, Data Import, and Management Tools Data Manipulator Data Filtering Tools Graphic Export Formats QuickTime Movies

A Schematic Representation of Aabel Pipeline Design

Data Flow and Document Inter-Relationships

The pipelines are data channels that (i) connect the Aabel Data Sources to Aabel Data Users, (ii) enable real-time, two-way interaction between Aabel documents and their inter-relationships, and (iii) allow simultaneous data analysis from multiple data sources. The pipeline architecture of Aabel has enabled the design of powerful and dynamic data exploration tools such as X-zooming, interactive data filtering, etc.

Changes During Transmission of Data Through the Pipeline

Aabel pipeline manager handles the following changes as the data move through the pipeline to the data users (i.e., graphic viewer and its Stats Analyzer, and data manipulator).

Unit Conversions:

Aabel provides built-in methods for tagging variables (worksheet data columns) with the units in which the data have been obtained. If this optional feature is used, as you perform data analysis and charting, Aabel pipeline manager will transform the data to the default units that can be set in the application preferences. For example, if a variable is tagged as feet, and the default unit for length is meter, Aabel will convert the data from feet to meter. In this way, the same variable can have different units in different worksheets, but data users (i.e., graphic viewer and data manipulator) will receive the data in the default unit.

Data Linking:

Every data source has a link checkbox. Unchecking the link checkbox of a data source will remove the corresponding data from the pipeline, before the data user receives the data.
Similarly, every data object (worksheet row) has a link checkbox, and unchecking this checkbox will remove that particular data point from the pipeline.

X-Zooming (Zooming that Excludes Data)

In addition to a traditional zooming tool (which is purely a graphical clipping tool), the graphic viewer has an X-zoom tool that is designed for walking through a hierarchy of numeric or categorical data. It excludes the data that are outside the zoomed area of a plot. When you use this tool, the data will be excluded from the Visualization & Statistics Pipeline, and hence are excluded from any calculations you may perform (e.g., they will not be included in regression calculations).

Multi-dimensional Filtering

Aabel data filtering tools allow data filtering according to multi-dimensional filter criteria that can span multiple variables. You can filter data with respect to numeric values, value ranges, multi-dimensional data regions, and text data properties
Data filtering can be performed in the data sources (worksheets, database metaphor) or within the data users (graphic viewer and data manipulator). Data filtering in the graphic viwer is interactive, i.e.,as you activate a defined filter, the filtered data will be removed from the pipeline, i.e., they will be excluded from data analysis and charting.