Skip to content

Opening and Saving Files

To open a file in Spectrum Analyzer, first start the software (spectrumanalyzer.exe) and click on the “Open” button icon in the toolbar:

This will open a popup window that will ask you to select the file you wish to open:

Spectrum Analyzer supports two types of files : (1) Spectre files (.spc), and, (2) CSV files:

  • Spectre files are the own file format of Spectrum Analyzer and enables you to save all information concerning your spectrum such as camera and plot settings, blank data etc. Spectre files can only be read by the Spectrum Analyzer application although it is not a proprietary file format since we have published its source code such that developers can integrate them in their own applications if they wish to.

  • CSV files are text files where data are separated by a comma symbol. Most commercial softwares (e.g. Microsoft Excel, Matlab…) support CSV files import which makes it an ideal format to exchange spectra with other people or software like Matlab for post-processing of the data. CSV files exported by Spectrum Analyzer only contains the plot data and does not contain program settings nor separate blank data.

You may also import files into Spectrum Analyzer by dragging the file from Windows to the application or by selecting it as the default application to open .spc or .csv files:

Once the file has been loaded the application toolbar will enable some of the actions:

  • Saving the data (either in .spc or in .csv). Data imported as CSV cannot be exported as Spectre file because they lack the contextual information when initially importing the CSV.

  • Copying data to the clipboard. After copying data to the clipboard you can paste it in other softwares like Microsoft Excel.

  • Saving as image (see below).

  • Configuring the plot data. This is discussed in configuring SpectrumAnalyzer.

  • Calibrating the spectrometer. This option is discussed in calibrating the spectrometer.

When using the image export functionality, the software will ask you which title you would like to put on your spectrum. You can either enter a title or leave the field empty. The program will then export a Bitmap (.bmp) of your spectrum with the title you selected. This option is handful when you need to generate images for reports or to exchange data with other people without having to disclose the data by sending a CSV or having to generate a plot in Excel.