DNA user manual
As you may already know from reading the DNA web pages, DNA consists of a system of interacting elements. These are referred to here for clarity only and details will be found elsewhere. These elements achieve the underlying job of DNA.
To ease use of DNA it comes with a GUI, the use of this and results it relays should be all the user need actually concern themselves with hopefully. The GUI can be run standalone or within another Java GUI. A two way communication channel operates between it and the ES which then uses the DPM and BCM. Later sections will detail the use of DNA with a particular BCM where there are differences. When run standalone the DNA GUI appears as below. The 'DNA Control' section remains visible independent of the operation in use, provides simple feedback and allows basic operations. The GUI has a tabbed layout to allow maximisation of the available screen space and a wizard type interface in one window. The initial messages in the 'Executive Output' window indicate successful start up of the underlying expert system and that communications have been established.
The GUI presently allows the automatic collection of two reference images separated by 90 degrees. The user can collect these standalone ('Collect Only') or go on to also characterize these to a point ready for data collection ('Collect and Characterize'). The latter involves auto-indexing and strategy determination by MOSFLM. Using the GUI as above two images will be collected as follows
The 'ref-' is automatically added to the prefix to help stop data collection images being overwritten. The oscillation range, exposure time and resolution are passed to and implemented by the BCM. If known the Bravais lattice can be specified or left unknown as shown. If the user chooses 'Collect and Characterize' the auto-indexing and strategy determination steps are performed for them. The GUI will swap tabs displaying the results after each step. Otherwise the user has to select and perform each step manually. The auto index and strategy panes are shown below.
Having performed the auto-indexing the ES goes on to calculate a data collection strategy based on the results. The parameters of the strategy can be left as seen or changed as desired by the user. Pressing 'Collect Data' will result in the BCM collecting the data whilst 'Collect & Integrate Data' will also process the data once it has been collected. The following strategy panel also shows the MOSFLM output tab in use, which can be selected at any time, and displays the standard MOSFLM log file as it is created. The 'Collection Progress' tab is still to be implemented.