Inspect model variable

The snapshot tool is only available once a model has been built and is ready to run. It is provided to inspect the values of complex data structures held by some model elements. By hovering over a model variable it is possible to view pop-up windows that contain an element's equation, description and value. But in some cases, particularly where the data have more than one dimension, this pop-up window is rather hard to read. In any case, if the data is a very large array, the central portion will be elided to prevent the popup window being too large. As an alternative, use the snapshot tool. This will pop-up a larger, permanent window with the values structured by dimension.

As its name implies, the snapshot tool provides a view of the data structure at a moment in time. You can leave the window displaying the snapshot open, run the model for some more time, and then click again on the same element to open a second window that displays the new data structure. Having the two windows open at the same time, each labelled with the time at which the snapshot was taken, is the easiest way to trace changes to an element or sequence of elements. If you would rather just see the current data, the snapshot tool includes an update button () which will refresh the displayed data with the current values from the model.

Saving data from snapshot tool

Normally you would use the data table helper to create a file containing model data. But because this tool is more oriented to displaying data interactively, it can operate very slowly with large tables. The snapshot tool is much quicker, although less flexible. Another alternative is to use the data logger helper, which is oriented towards storing data from many variables at once.

To save data from the snapshot tool at a given time point, hit the save button. It will prompt you for a file name and the data will be saved to this file as a comma-separated (.csv) file that can be loaded into a spreadsheet. The indices will be listed in columns to the left, outermost first, and the actual data items will appear in the rightmost column.

You can also use the snapshot tool to save data as a time series as the model runs. To do this, hit the log button () and select a file name. Then start the model executing. The values displayed in the snapshot window will not change, but after each display interval the current values will be appended to the file. In this case the indices will be listed in rows at the top of the file, outermost first, with the actual data items appearing below them, one row for each time point. The times themselves will appear in the leftmost column. To stop logging, hit the log button again.

Remember that the snapshot tool is disabled until the model has been built. Only after building the model do the elements have values. The tool is available at any point during the model run.

In: Contents >> Working with model diagrams