Changelog

Here you can see the full list of changes between each Concert release.

Version 0.33

First decentralized release on April 9th 2025. There are local and remote experiments. The remote ones are new and they lift the processing burden from concert, which up to now did everything. Instead, there are separate tango servers running on separate computers which get the data via ZMQ streams and do things like writing data, online reconstruction and so on. For more details see documentation.

What’s Changed

Full Changelog: https://github.com/ufo-kit/concert/compare/v0.32.0…v0.33.0

Version 0.32

Released on June 20th 2024.

Features

  • it is possible to specify rights on writing frames

  • added PCO timestamp check addon

  • added ImageWithMetadata for camera frames and store the metadata in tiff files

Notes

  • camera.stream stashes the trigger_source and restores it

  • uca camera caches state to speed up recording

Version 0.31

Released on May 11th 2022.

Features

  • it is possible to use await statements in concert sessions outside of async def functions

  • AsyncObject allows us to have async constructors async def __ainit__, which is very useful when we need to use async code in constructors, e.g. setting a parameter on a device

  • Experiments were greatly extended by classes which can be customized and run at beam lines without many more changes

  • Monochromators were enhanced

  • Experiment director was introduced to take care of high-throughput measurements

  • Experiments can write metadata to json

  • Parameter limits getters and setters are coroutine functions

  • Add ElementSelector device for having discrete choices

  • ascan allows one to include the stop value in the scan

  • walkers have create_writer method for convenience

  • walkers can be used in async with statements for safe access from multiple concurrent coroutines

  • concert.coroutines.sinks.Accumulate allows non-re-setting behavior between runs

  • concert.processes.common.align_rotation_axis allows multiple frame consumers

  • concert.devices.cameras.uca.Camera gets state from the libuca object

API breaks

  • Parameterizable inherits from AsyncObject which needs an __ainit__

constructor, so every sub-class must change its __init__ to async def __ainit__. - run_in_loop_thread_blocking is gone in favour of using one event loop and

__ainit__ constructors

Notes

  • we replaced Travis by CircleCI

Pull Requests

#485 from ufo-kit/circleci-project-setup #483 from ufo-kit/new-metadata #464 from ufo-kit/monochromator-enhancement #459 from ufo-kit/experiment-director #409 from ufo-kit/fix-uca-state #467 from ufo-kit/grating-inteferometry-experiment #478 from ufo-kit/hercules #473 from ufo-kit/walkers #471 from ufo-kit/ascan-include-last #470 from ufo-kit/elementselector #466 from ufo-kit/fix-tango-loop #458 from ufo-kit/new-experiments #461 from ufo-kit/async-limits

Version 0.30

  • Simplify scans, no Region and no need of using resolve on the result

Features

  • concurrency transition to asyncio, from user perspective the usage is more or less the same, e.g. motor.move(1 * q.mm) starts relative motion in the background, motor.position = 1 * q.mm sets the position in a blocking way.

  • ctrl-k cancels all background commands and calls emergency_stop on all devices in the session

  • Online reconstruction is capable of doing the flat correction with image averaging

  • concert.experiments.addons.ImageWriter blocks for every acquisition

Viewers

  • Subclass Parameterizeable, properties turned into parameters

  • Added Simple matplotlib backend without colorbar but faster

  • Added PyQtGraphViewer

  • Added downsampling parameter

  • Added show_refresh_rate parameter

  • Parameter limits accepts “stream”, i.e. the limits are updated for the first image of __call__ and then kept the same, “auto” updates limits for every image and a tuple fixes them to min and max.

API breaks

  • Removed queue, sinograms, backproject, PickSlice, process coroutines from concert.coroutines.filters

  • Removed Backproject, FlatCorrectedBackproject, FlatCorrect (was there twice), center_rotation_axis, compute_rotation_axis from concert.ext.ufo

  • Removed concert.networking.aerotech and concert.networking.wago

  • Removed concert.devices.motors.crio

  • Removed concert.helpers.hasattr_raise_exceptions

  • Removed Future.cancel_operation, cancellation is implemented via asyncio.CancelledError

  • Removed concert.helpers.Region

  • Removed devices:

    • concert.devices.motors.aerotech

    • concert.devices.io.aerotech

    • concert.devices.lightsources.fiberlite

    • concert.devices.lightsources.led.

    • concert.devices.photodiodes.edmundoptics

    • concert.devices.scales.adventurer

    • concert.devices.monochromators.newport.py

  • Removed processes:

    • concert.processes.common.find_beam

    • concert.processes.common.drift_to_beam

    • concert.processes.common.center_to_beam

    • concert.processes.common.scan_param_feedback

  • Removed callbacks from concert.processes.common.scan

  • Removed concert.experiments.base.Acquisition.connect for simplicity, i.e. the acquisition and consumption of data happens always at the same time, for special behavior, special classes/functions should be used

  • Device.abort replaced by Device.emergency_stop

  • many functions which were not asynchronous before are now, e.g. Camera.start_recording

Version 0.11

Released on April 14th 2021, which is the last release for Python 2.

Features

  • 345c2e7 Add stack-based name resolution

  • f8e9ec5 experiments: add per-run log handler

  • 41bfa5e Add State to Experiment

  • 253d4d5 Add external limits to parameter

  • 40debd7 Added target value to parameter

  • 6eb07fd Added LensChanger

  • dc0b395 Add readers

  • ec90dcd ufo: Add FlatCorrect class

  • e7326bd Add dummy ImagingExperiment

  • f90379d Add fwhm to find_parameters

  • a8c705b imageprocessing: add filter_low_frequencies

  • e181587 Add a simple online reconstruction addon

  • 51d6ec2 Add ROI selection support to ImagingFileExperiment

  • 2ba2fe1 add fraction and percent to quantities

  • e59697b Add progress bar

  • 43c4e98 Add ImagingFileExperiment

  • e823b52 base and dummy attenuatorbox added

  • ece80dd Add flat field correction task

  • 1ec03be addons: Enable async I/O by ImageWriter

  • 6535790 Add docs command to Concert program

  • 0f91277 Add Flask-like extension system

  • 6c02a84 abort on ctrl-c

  • align axis: auto-compute metric_eps by default (better rotation axis alignment)

Pull Requests

  • #374 from ufo-kit/calculate_motor_velocity

  • #389 from ufo-kit/add-flatcorrect

  • #396 from ufo-kit/fix-388

  • #419 from ufo-kit/add-percent-quantity

  • #436 from ufo-kit/align-rotation-axis

  • #450 from ufo-kit/experiment-state

  • #447 from ufo-kit/device-names

  • #445 from ufo-kit/experiment-logs

  • #437 from ufo-kit/add-lens-selector

  • #442 from ufo-kit/always-execute-finish-in-experiment

  • #443 from ufo-kit/add_enable_disable_to_motors

  • #434 from ufo-kit/add-state-to-experiment

  • #435 from ufo-kit/add-external-softlimits

  • #439 from ufo-kit/add-state-to-monochromator

  • #339 from ufo-kit/ufo-multi-gpus

  • #432 from ufo-kit/fix-requirements-python2.7

  • #433 from ufo-kit/fix-typo-in-experiment

  • #430 from ufo-kit/cleanup-writers

  • #429 from ufo-kit/add-readers

  • #425 from ufo-kit/add_parameters_to_experiments

  • #428 from ufo-kit/dependabot/pip/pyxdg-0.26

  • #427 from ufo-kit/fix-fsm-transitioning-error

  • #417 from ufo-kit/add-progressbar

  • #412 from ufo-kit/enable-writer-offset

  • #411 from ufo-kit/multipage-file-camera

  • #410 from ufo-kit/faster-dummy-camera

  • #408 from ufo-kit/write_multi

  • #405 from ufo-kit/add-attenuator

  • #401 from ufo-kit/fix-400

  • #399 from ufo-kit/Flake8

  • #397 from ufo-kit/fix-367

  • #395 from ufo-kit/fix-385

  • #394 from ufo-kit/docs

  • #393 from ufo-kit/docs

  • #391 from ufo-kit/forbid-addon-reattachment

  • #387 from ufo-kit/extend-queue

  • #379 from ufo-kit/fix-flatcorrectedbackproject

  • #383 from ufo-kit/fix-dimax-start-recording

  • #381 from ufo-kit/fix-ufo-segfault

  • #370 from ufo-kit/generalize-acquisitions

  • #378 from ufo-kit/print-noasync-traceback

  • #377 from ufo-kit/accumulate-addon

  • #376 from ufo-kit/numpy-accumulate

  • #375 from ufo-kit/fix-DirectoryWalker-relative-paths

  • #369 from ufo-kit/extensions

Fixes

  • #400: Fix properties mixup of uca-cameras

  • #392 and support for current Pint versions’

  • #388: Fixed units checking of Numeric

  • #385: Optional output of resolve without units

  • #371: override grab only in uca cameras

  • #301: don’t print traceback for DISABLE_ASYNC

Version 0.10

Released on February 9th 2015.

Improvements

  • Uca cameras support optional parameters.

  • We added convenience functions for acquiring certain image types like dark fields, etc.

  • We can determine tomographic rotation axis based on the convenince functions mentioned above.

  • Hard-limit state is allowed as target in motor’s home method.

  • Added a decorator for measuring function execution time.

  • Added XRayTube device.

  • Added Gripper device.

  • Added asynchronous grab Camera.grab_async.

  • Added SampleChanger device.

  • Parameter setters are abortable. Thanks to that we added the abort function to stop actions on devices. It can be used also per-device.

  • Simplified concert.base, we don’t use metaclasses anymore.

  • Added normalize for intensity normalization.

  • Added Camera.convert for converting images before they are returned by the camera’s grab method (useful for flipping, etc.).

  • Added a generic process coroutine which takes a callable and applies it to the coming data.

  • We check soft limits for correct unit.

  • Added EDF reading support via fabio.

  • Added experiment Addon which operate on the data produced by an experiment (e.g. image viewing, online reconstruction, etc.).

  • Added n-dimensional scans.

  • Added ssh+tmux support via concert-server and concert-connect.

  • Added session export command.

  • Added session loading via –filename.

  • Walker can write data stored in lists, not only in a coroutine way.

API breaks

  • Renamed fetch command to import.

  • Use positive config names (ENABLE_ instead of DISABLE_).

Fixes

  • Various beam time fixes from #345.

  • IPython version check in #332.

  • #300, #301, #306, #308, #310, #331, #353.

Version 0.9

Released on August 15th 2014.

Improvements

  • The state machine mechanism is not special anymore but directly inherits from Parameter.

  • Added walker mechanism to write sequence data in hierarchical structures such as directories or HDF5 files.

  • The long-standing gevent integration with IPython is finished at least for IPython >= 2.0.

  • Added @expects decorator to annotate what a function can receive.

  • Added async.resolve() to get result of future lists.

  • Added accumulate sink and timer coroutines.

  • Added Timestamp class for PCO cameras that decodes the BCD timestamp embedded in a frame.

  • Added optional wait_on to getter and setter of a ParameterValue.

  • We now raise an exception in if a uca frame is not available.

  • Experiments have now hooks for preparation and cleanup tasks.

  • Added basic control loop classes.

  • Add binary signal device class.

API breaks

  • scan yields futures instead of returning a list

  • Moved specific pco cameras to concert.devices.cameras.pco.

  • Moved write_images to concert.storage

  • Removed base.MultiContext and base.Process

Fixes

  • #198, #254, #271, #277, #280, #286, #293

  • The pint dependency had to be raised to 0.5.2 in order to compute sums of quantities.

Version 0.8

Released on April 16th 2014.

Improvements

  • concert log can now --follow the current operation.

  • Soft limits and parameters can be locked both temporarily and permanently.

  • Added new @quantity decorator for simple cases.

  • The concert` binary can now be started without a session.

  • Added cross-correlation tomographic axis finding.

  • Added frame consumer to align_rotation_axis.

  • Simplify file camera and allow resetting it

  • Added ports property to the base IO device.

  • Added Photodiode base device class.

  • Added Fiber-Lite halogen lightsource.

  • Added LEDs connected within the wago.

  • Added stream coroutine to cameras.

  • Added EdmundOptics photodiode.

  • Added PCO.4000 camera.

  • Added Wago input/output device.

API breaks

  • Raise CameraError instead of ValueError

  • Change Pco’s freerun to stream

Fixes

  • Fix FileCamera pixel units in grab

  • Import GLib.GError correctly

  • Make recording context exception-safe

  • Fix quantity problem with recent Pint versions

  • #200, #203, #206, #209, #228, #230, #245

Version 0.7

Released on February 17th 2014.

Improvements

  • Added beam finding and centering

  • threaded decorator uses daemonic threads

  • Added downsize, queue, stall, PickSlice to coroutine filters

  • Added reconstruction of the whole volume using UFO Framework

  • Documentation was restructured significantly (split to usage/API)

  • Added tomography helper functions

  • Crio motor support continuous rotation

  • PyplotViewer can be configured for faster drawing capabilities using blit

  • Added dummy Scales

  • Tests cover all devices (at least try to instantiate them)

  • Added pixel units, q.pixel (shorthand q.px)

  • Changed prompt color to terminal default

  • Added Positioner device

  • Added Detector device

API Breaks

  • Finite state machine was reworked significantly

  • Motors were cleaned from mixins and hard-limit was incorporated into them

  • recording() context was added to cameras

  • backprojector coroutine filter was significantly simplified

  • average_images arguments changed

  • Experiments were completely restructured based on usage of Acquisition

  • PyplotViewer plotting signature changed

  • Remove leftover beam line specific shutters

  • Many getters/setters were replaced by properties, especially in the concert.ext.viewers module

  • Appropriate get_ set_ functions were replaced by non-prefixed ones

Fixes

  • #118, #128, #132, #133, #139, #148, #149, #150, #157, #159, #165, #169, #173, #174, #175, #176, #178, #179, #181, #184, #189, #192

Version 0.6

Released on December 10th 2013.

Improvements

  • Concert now comes with an experimental gevent backend that will eventually replace the thread pool executor based asynchronous infrastructure.

  • Each device can now have an explicit State object and @transition applied to function which will change the state depending on the successful outcome of the decorated function.

  • 1D data plotting is implemented as PyplotCurveViewer.

  • The concert binary now knows the cp command to make a copy of a session. The start command can receive a log level and with the --non-interactive option run a session as a script.

  • Devices and parameters can store their current parameter values with stash and restore them later with restore.

  • Changed the IPython prompt.

  • Added the NewPort 74000 Monochromator.

  • Provide a require function that will scream when the required Concert version is not installed.

API breaks

  • Motor is renamed to LinearMotor for all devices.

  • Parameter objects are now declared at class-level instead of at run-time within the class constructor.

  • concert.storage.create_folder renamed to concert.storage.create_directory

  • concert.ext.viewers.PyplotViewer substituted by 1D and 2D viewers concert.ext.viewers.PyplotCurveViewer and concert.ext.viewers.PyplotImageViewer

  • To wait on a Future you have to call .join instead of .wait.

  • Coroutine functions and decorators moved to concert.coroutines[.base], asynchronous functions and decorators moved to concert.async.

  • Removed is_async

  • Configuration moved to concert.config

  • Method names of concert.ext.ufo.InjectProcess changed.

Fixes

  • #168, #166, #152, #147, #158, #150, #157, #95, #138

  • Many more concerning the camera implementation.

Version 0.5

Released on October 31st 2013.

Improvements

  • Python 3 is supported and can be tested with tox.

  • Most imports are delayed in the concert binary to reduce startup time.

  • We do not depend on Logbook anymore but use Python’s logging module.

  • Experiments can now be modelled with the concert.experiments module.

  • concert.ext.viewers.PyplotViewer can be used to show 2D image data.

  • Spyder command plugin is now available. That means if you have Spyder installed you can control Concert from an IDE instead of from IPython.

  • Tests were restructured for easier access.

API breaks

  • concert.connections package moved to concert.networking module

  • Renamed concert.helpers.multicast to broadcast to reflect its true purpose.

  • Session helpers such as dstate and ddoc have been moved to concert.session.utils.

  • Frames grabbed with the libuca devices will return a copy instead of the same buffer.

Fixes:

  • #106, #113 and many more which did not deserve an issue number.

Version 0.4

Released on October 7th 2013.

Improvements

  • Tests and rotation axis alignment is faster now.

  • Soft limits were added to the parameter (accessible with .lower and .upper)

  • Cleaner inet connection implemention.

  • Base pumps and scales were added.

  • Concert no longer depends on testfixtures for running tests.

  • Started work on flexible data processing schemes for light computation based on a coroutine approach.

  • Integrated tifffile.py in case libtiff is not available.

  • concert mv renames sessions.

  • @threaded decorator can be used to run a function in its own thread.

  • Scanner parameters can now be set in the constructor.

  • Parameters can now be locked independently of the parent device. However, if done so, no one else can lock the device.

  • Add code_of function to show the source of a function.

  • Introduced coroutine based data processing facility.

API breaks

  • Renamed to_steps to to_device and do not drop units

  • camera.grab returns None if no data is available

  • uca.Camera exposes the wrapped GObject camera as an attribute called uca instead of camera.

  • minimum, maximum and intervals are now longer implemented as Parameter objects of Scanner but simple attributes.

  • asynchronous module content has been moved to helpers

  • Removed Scanner class in favor of scan function.

Fixes:

  • Integration with all IPython releases works again.

  • runtests.py returns 0 on success.

  • #19, #55, #71, #78, #79

Version 0.3

Released on August 19th 2013.

Note: This release breaks Python 2.6 compatibility!

  • Calibration classes moved to concert.devices.calibration

  • Remove concert.processes.focus and reorganize concert.optimization package, the focusing can be implemented by Maximizer with a proper feedback.

  • Add --repo parameter to the fetch command. With this flag, session files version controlled with Git can be imported.

  • Use pint instead of quantities. pint is faster for smaller Numpy arrays, stricter and does not depend on Numpy.

  • Things can now run serialized if concert.asynchronous.DISABLE is set to True.

  • Restructured tests into separate directories.

  • Fix PDF generation of the docs.

  • Fix problem with IPython version >= 0.10.

Version 0.2

Released on July 14th 2013.

  • Move third-party code to concert.ext. For example get_tomo_scan_result must be imported from concert.ext.nexus.

  • Adds concert fetch to pull session files from remote locations.

  • Code cleanup

Version 0.1.1

Bug fix release, released on May 25th 2013

  • Fixes Python 3 support.

  • Monochromator fix.

Version 0.1

First public release.