USGS Velocity Profile Viewer

Velocity Profile Viewer

The Velocity Profile Viewer (VPV) plays an interactive animation representing the movement of water in an estuary, river, lake, or reservoir. It is especially useful for previewing and presenting data from Acoustic Doppler Current Profilers or 3D hydrodynamic models. The animation can be viewed from any angle using arrows or a shaded surface to represent the velocity vectors. Animation can be stopped, single-stepped, or played at several different speeds. The profile on the screen can also be saved to a printable PostScript file.
Screen Shot of VPV

VPV was written by John Donovan for use by members of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) San Francisco Bay Hydrodynamics Project in Sacramento, California. The program reads a data format that is commonly used by researchers at the USGS to store a time series of 3D velocity profiles. VPV is written in C using the OpenGL and GLUT libraries for graphics. Versions have been compiled for Windows and Silicon Graphics platforms, and it can be compiled for other platforms. The program is released here for use by others subject to the legal notice below.

For full documentation, see the VPV User Manual.

For other software, see the Gr web page.

Download Data

Documentation
README.txt Explains how to install and use VPV.

Sample data file
sample.vel 838k Download a sample data file to use as input to VPV.

Executables
PC The page for downloading VPV for Microsoft Windows.
SGI The page for downloading VPV for Silicon Graphics computers.

Source Code
src.zip 46k Download the source code for VPV.

Legal Notice

VPV is free software. Permission is hereby granted to use VPV as long as the USGS is given credit for being the original creator of the software and this notice accompanies any redistribution of the software. A modified version of VPV should not be distributed without the recipients receiving a copy of the original distribution.

Every effort was made to make VPV accurate and "bug-free". However, the software is provided "AS IS," without a warranty of any kind. VPV is not guaranteed to work on all data files, or to display correct results. The USGS shall not be liable for any damages suffered by the user or any third party as a result of using or distributing the software. The USGS does not guarantee that the software will perform as described in the accompanying README file, and is not responsible for problems caused if the software does not operate properly.

Contact Information

If you have questions, suggestions, or bug reports, contact one of the people listed below.

John M. Donovan
jmd@usgs.gov
(916) 278-3120

Peter E. Smith
pesmith@usgs.gov
(916) 278-3125

Back to:
USGS Water Resources of California
USGS Water Resources Division
USGS Headquarters

The URL for this page is <http://water.wr.usgs.gov/program/sfbay/vpv/>.

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