Version history

Version history#

This page shows major changes in recent releases with an emphasis on what the user should be aware of.

0.0.86 - 24th of July 2026#

  • Reworked geometry visualization, now includes more backends

  • The default for show_instrument is still webgl-classic, but a backend keyword argument was introduced

  • backend=pythreejs has several new features, but pythreejs is not considered a dependency; install it manually

  • With the pythreejs backend several widget options are included: jump to components, click on them to see code, and change how they are colored

  • Coloring can distinguish components by component index or received intensity

  • A matplotlib backend was added as well. It is best for 2D plots and can be called with backend=matplotlib_2d and projection=zy (zx / xy are also available)

0.0.85 - 9th of July 2026#

  • Added tests for instrument_diagnostics module

  • Fixed deprecated fontweight specifier

0.0.83 - 18th of June 2026#

  • Component reader now correctly reads all components in recent McStas versions

  • Diagrams and diagnostics more resilient to different input types

  • mpi='auto' now supported, allows mcrun to use maximum parallelisation allowed by the OS

  • show_settings and widget now work correctly with mpi='auto'

  • New help system for set_parameters on component and instrument objects in jupyter notebooks (autocompletes parameter names)

  • set_parameters no longer modifies input dictionaries

  • mcrun return code is now handled, providing feedback on simulation success/failure

  • Hotfix of event_plotter and dataformat

0.0.80 - 23rd of April 2026#

  • MCPL output now found correctly when the variable input is a parameter or char array (not just literal strings)

  • Diagnostics instruments select restore_neutron or restore_xray as appropriate

  • copy follows typical McStas logic and does not carry keywords

  • Fixed issue where instrument names containing “Param” caused a read failure

  • Fixed diagram failure when no intensity was reported

  • Fixed plotting of 0D monitors after metadata field name changes

  • Fixed issue #60: MCPL keys no longer overwrite _N key

0.0.78 - 20th of February 2026#

  • Plotting functions now accept return_fig_ax=True keyword to return figure and axis objects for further customization

  • Fixed exponential notation formatting on plots

  • McStas/McXtrace resource directory can now be auto-detected via mcrun --showcfg=resourcedir when $MCSTAS environment variable is not set

  • Generated instrument header improved, including parameter descriptions compatible with mcdoc, thanks Peter Willendrup

0.0.75 - 19th of August 2025#

  • Default instrument visualization changed to webgl-classic, works from notebooks with McStas 3.5.35+

  • Improved NeXus data reading

  • Added handling for damaged UTF-8 strings in instrument files

  • SEARCH statements now support the EQ operator

0.0.73 - 8th of November 2024#

  • Fixed bug where DEPENDENCY lines were read as additional parameters in components

  • SEARCH statement now written before the first component instead of near DEFINE, improving compatibility

  • Fixed escape character handling in instrument files

0.0.71 - 11th of September 2024#

  • All final values given to components (parameters, AT, ROTATED) can now be written to file

  • SEARCH statements updated to load components from the appropriate folder

0.0.68 - 25th of July 2024#

  • New instrument_checker tool for validating instruments, useful for checking contents of created instrument objects

  • Auto-detection of McStas/McXtrace installation parameters when running from within a related environment

  • McXtrace sessions can now visualize using mxdisplay (-webgl/-pyqtgraph)

  • Improved reliability of reading NeXus data

  • Fixed mcdisplay path resolution when MCSTAS not in environment

0.0.64 - 1st of December 2023#

  • NeXus (.nxs) files can now be read with load_data and load_all_data functions

  • h5py added to requirements for NeXus support

  • Event data no longer plotted directly (results not meaningful and often crashed the plotter)

  • Fixed widget plot placement on newer ipywidget versions

  • Tight layout applied to all figures

  • mcdisplay searched in both executable path and package path

0.0.60 - 4th of August 2023#

  • Fixed diagnostic output failure when instrument used target_index logic

  • Component reader improvements: handles comments in parameter regions, better C variable name validation

0.0.58 - 25th of April 2023#

  • Support for new McStas features

    • DEPENDENCY: instrument.set_dependency info here

    • SEARCH: instrument.add_search / component.add_search instrument info here component info here

    • NeXus: settings(NeXus=True), still can’t read data so backengine will fail after writing data

    • openacc: settings(openacc=True), for compiling to GPU

  • Infers parameter, variable and component names

    • Each time anything is added to an instrument, one gives it a name and python variable name, now the McStas name can be inferred from the python name so the following statements are equivalent:

      • wavelength = instrument.add_parameter(“wavelength”, value=5.0)

      • wavelength = instrument.add_parameter(value=5.0)

    • And likewise

      • my_arm = instrument.add_component(“my_arm”, “Arm”)

      • my_arm = instrument.add_component(“Arm)

  • Examples are being updated to run McStas 3.X, not all documentation updated yet

  • Fixed issue where astrox components where loaded in McXtrace

0.0.52 - 17th of November 2022#

  • New features for diagnostics of instruments, tutorial here

    • Diagrams can now plot intensity and ncount along instrument

    • Diagrams can now plot any variable along the instrument

    • Diagnostics object can show beam at a specified number of points in the instrument

  • McStasEventData can now generate binned data, described in data

  • All datasets now have attributes total I / E / N in metadata, shown in data

  • McStasScript can now read 0D monitors

  • Improvements to reader, better handling of using COPY for component names

  • Instrument objects now have a mccode_version attribute that keeps major version as integer

0.0.51 - 17th of October 2022#

  • New feature for segmenting the instrument using MCPL input/output tutorial here

  • Printed components now conform to McStas syntax (contribution from Peter Willendrup and Erik Knudsen)

0.0.50 - 20th of June 2022#

  • Support for McStas 3.X

    • USERVARS can now be used with add_user_var parameters_and_variables

    • instrument_reader can read McStas 3.X files with simple USERVARS

  • Improvements to instrument diagrams

  • Introduced checks for using same name for parameters, declare variables and user variables

  • Now possible to easily show instrument file for debugging with show_instrument_file

0.0.48 - 10th of June 2022#

  • Improvements to instrument diagram

    • Colors component depending on category

    • EXTEND and WHEN shown with decorating component box

    • Hovering mouse over left side of box shows component info

    • All Union connections included

    • Improved line arrows to turn in a few segments, greatly clarifying reading busy diagrams

    • Included in all documentation

  • Bug fix in simulator widget that avoids a crash when value in text field could not be converted to float

  • Included documentation on widgets in widget_user_guide

  • Now allows for spaces in McStas path, working on how this could work for data path

0.0.47 - 31th of May 2022#

Introducing instrument diagrams, they are really useful for getting a quick overview of an instrument

  • Instrument diagrams now available, use the instrument method show_diagram

  • Instrument output_path now reports to libpyvinyl calculator path system (Thanks Shervin)

  • Update of the documentation to include show_diagram in instrument user guide, JUMP tutorial

0.0.44 - 16th of May 2022#

This version is a cleanup of the syntax and streamlining of the package. It improves the consistency of the language use, removes unused methods and is better at recognizing when wrong input is made.

  • Renaming of methods to make the “show” verb in method names more consistent.

    • show_components did show all available McStas components, now shows components in current instrument

    • print_components still shows all components in current instrument, but also a warning pointing to show_instrument as best practice

    • available_components now shows all available McStas components for help purposes

  • Moved away from allowing arbitrary keyword arguments in some places, so it is now an error to misspell keyword arguments.

    • Instrument initialization

    • Instrument.settings method

    • Instrument.show_components (and print_components) methods

    • Component initialization

  • Removed instrument methods for manipulating components like set_component_AT() as they provided an additional way of doing the same thing, but more error prone than working with the component objects directly.

  • Moved widgets out of base import of package to speed up import

  • Widgets for Jupyter notebooks now loaded with:

    • import mcstasscript.jb_interface as ms_widget

    • ms_widget.show(instrument) / ms_widget.show(data) shows widget interface for instrument / data

    • ms_widget.SimInterface(instrument) needed if one wants to retrieve data made in an interface

  • Added instrument methods for moving and removing components (both explained in instrument object page)

    • instrument.move_component

    • instrument.remove_comopnent

  • Introduced error checking before writing / running McStas file, can be disabled with settings(checks=False)

    • Checks all Component AT / ROTATED RELATIVE statements have valid targets

    • Checks that variables used as component parameters have been declared

  • When using show_instrument in a notebook, a new tab was opened and it was shown in the notebook, changed it so no new tab is made when running in a notebook. If a new tab is desired use the keyword argument new_tab and set it to True.