QCoDeS 0.35.0

QCoDeS 0.35.0 (2022-10-03)

NOTE: this release includes changes from :doc:0.35.0b1,
refer to that changelog for details of those changes.

In this release a large refactoring of the QCoDeS modules organization has taken place.
Among other changes the instrument module has been split into a parameters and
instrument module, the dond functions have been moved to the dataset module
and several methods removed from the public API of the utils module.

The new API is documented in the :ref:api section of the QCoDeS homepage.

Going forward we aim to establish a policy where the QCoDeS public API is defined
by modules explicitly documented in the :ref:api and importable from submodules at most
one level deep. I.e. from qcodes.instrument import InstrumentChannel is supported but
f`rom qcodes.instrument.channel import InstrumentChannel is considered unsupported.

Importing from previously existing locations should continue to work
but it is recommended to update to the new API.
In the future we may deprecate and eventually remove these modules
but no firm date is set for this.

Please report any issues you may see with importing from the previously existing API
or if you depend on any functions, classes etc. not available from the new public API.

This release also includes a significant but still incomplete refactoring of the QCoDeS
instrument drivers in qcodes.instrument_drivers. Many but not all drivers have been updated
to use names that conform to the standard documented
here <../examples/writing_drivers/Creating-Instrument-Drivers.ipynb#Naming-the-Instrument-class>__
i.e. they use CamelCase as other classes and are named as InstrumentvendorModel
and are importable directly from the instrument vendor module i.e.
from qcodes.instrument_drivers.AimTTi import AimTTiPL068P .
Older names for the classes are still importable from their original places unless explicitly
documented otherwise. In the future we may deprecate and eventually remove the instrument driver classes whos names don't conform to the standard,
but no firm date is set for this.

Breaking Changes:

• The standard metadata as defined by pep621 has moved from setup.cfg
  to pyproject.toml. This should have no user facing consequences unless
  you install qcodes from source using a very old version of pip (<19)
  or use unusual pip configurations. (#4382#)

• :class:VisaInstrument no longer calls :meth:VisaInstrument.set_address as part of its
  initialization. If you customize :meth:VisaInstrument.set_address in a subclass you may have
  to adapt that class. (:pr:4397)

• The deprecated method check_error has been removed from the visa instrument class. (#4426)

• The unused attribute shared_kwargs on the Instrument class has been removed. (#4427)

• The following InstrumentChannel classes have changed name for consistency.
  This is expected to be a change with few user facing implications unless you are explicitly
  subclassing the mentioned classes.

  • DG1062Burst has changed name to RigolDG1062Burst
  • DG1062Channel has changed name to RigolDG1062Channel (#4538)

• DataSet.get_metadata method for retrieving a metadata value for a
  given tag is now case-sensitive with respect to the tag.
  For example, if metadata was added with dataset.add_metadata('something', 1),
  it can only be retrieved by using its exact casing of the tag,
  dataset.get_metadata('something'), and not e.g.
  dataset.get_metadata('SomeThinG'). In the previous versions of QCoDeS,
  any casing of the tag in DataSet.get_metadata would work and return the
  value stored under that tag. Note that this change brings consistency
  with how getting metadata via the dataset.metadata works:
  dataset.metadata['something'] does return the value, and
  dataset.metadata['SomeThinG'] does not. (#4658)

Improved:

• ChannelTuple and ChannelList has gained the ability to call methods defined on the channels
  in the sequence in a way similar to how QCoDeS Functions can be called. (#4292)

• dond has gained the ability to sweep multiple parameters at the same time enabling the creation of more complex
  measurements. (#4325)

• Improve performance of sqlite3 converters and adapters used to write and read in the database.

  Get rid of sqlite3.Row and irrelevant unpacking to list. (#4446)

• Settings of QCoDeS Validators are now available as properties (mostly read-only),
  e.g. min_value and max_value of the Numbers validator can now be accessed
  via numbers_validator_instance.min_value and numbers_validator_instance.max_value (#4602)

• Fixed a bug in the QCoDeS JSON encoder that would trigger an infinite recursion for snapshots containing
  bytes (bytestrings with a b prefix). (#4621)

• InstrumentBase and ParameterBase now call snapshot() on _meta_attrs attributes that inherit from Metadatable. (#4655)

• The Dataset no longer prints upgrade progressbars when upgrading an empty database. This means that
  the progressbar will no longer be shown when creating a new database. (#4969)

Improved Drivers:

• A parameter auto_freq_ref was added to the Keysight.N51x1 class.
  From the Keysight manual:
  This command enables or disables the ability of the signal generator to
  automatically select between the internal and an external reference oscillator.

  In addition, the val_mapping dictionary of the rf_output parameter is now using the create_on_off_val_mapping function. (#4472)

• Add get_idn to AMI 430 3D virtual instrument driver so that it does not raise a warning when added to a station (#4610)

New:

• :class:InstrumentBase has a property label that can host
  a human-readable label/title of the instrument.
  The label can be set in the init. (#4460)

QCoDeS 0.35.0b1

QCoDeS 0.35.0b1 (2022-07-08)

This is a beta release of the upcoming QCoDeS 0.35.0 release.

In this release a large refactoring of the QCoDeS modules organization has taken place.
Among other changes the instrument module has been split into a parameters and
instrument module, the dond functions have been moved to the dataset module
and several methods removed from the public API of the utils module.

The new API is documented in the :ref:api section of the QCoDeS homepage.

Going forward we aim to establish a policy where the QCoDeS public API is defined
by modules explicitly documented in the :ref:api and importable from submodules at most
one level deep. I.e. from qcodes.instrument import InstrumentChannel is supported but
from qcodes.instrument.channel import InstrumentChannel is considered unsupported.

Importing from previously existing locations should continue to work
but it is recommended to update to the new API.
In the future we may deprecate and eventually remove these modules
but no firm date is set for this.

Please report any issues you may see with importing from the previously existing API
or if you depend on any functions, classes etc. not available from the new public API.

Breaking Changes:

• Removed deprecated units property from DataArray. (#4358)
• Removed deprecated qcodes.version module. Use qcodes.__version__ (#4307)

Improved:

• :func:qcodes.dataset.doNd now logs more information about how parameters are
  unpacked and grouped making it easier to debug. (#4288)
• do_nd: save plot with 'tight' bbox to prevent tick marks with long labels
  pusing out the axis label out of the canvas window and not visible (#4360)
• Significant refactor of internal modules and public API (#4357, #4355,
  #4353, #4351, #4350, #4349, #4348, #4334, #4330,
  #4326, #4316, #4309, #4307, #4306, #4300, #4294,
  #4286, #4283, #4275, #4274, #4272, #4266, #4237,
  #4224, #3972, #4265, #3536)
• Fixed bug in fallback code for Sphinx extension breaking documentation of certain attributes (#4223)

New Drivers:

• Add Keithley 2634B model to 2600 driver (#4290)

Improved Drivers:

• The Keysight N52 series drivers have gained a parameter to control RF output. (#4301)
• Improved Keysight N51x1 driver: make frequency option detection compatible with multiple options installed on device. (#4342)

0.34.1 - June 2022 (2022-06-14)

QCoDeS 0.34.1 (2022-06-14)

Breaking Changes:

• Restrictions on instrument names are now less strict than in 0.34.0. Submodules are allowed
  to have names that are not valid identifier as long as the full name is an valid identifier. (#4257)

0.34.0 - June 2022 (2022-06-13)

Breaking Changes:

• The deprecated driver for ZI UHFLI has been removed. Please use the drivers provided by zhinst-qcodes. (#4081)
• InstrumentBase class now raises error if name is an invalid identifier.
  This effects creation of instruments, channels, modules. (#4178)
• The deprecated fallback for visa addresses containing an @ and the backend has been removed. (#4219)
• QCoDeS no longer explicitly sets the read and write terminators to "" (The empty string) by default.
  The default terminators are now set by PyVISA. This should only have implications for RS232 instruments where
  the default read and write terminators now are \r. (#4219)

New:

• The QCoDeS instrument baseclass has gained a method invalidate_cache.
  This will mark the cache of all parameters on the instrument and its submodules as
  invalid. This is useful if you manually (e.g. via the front panel) make changes to
  the instrument that QCoDeS cannot know about. (#4161`)

Improved:

• Improved conversion between qcodes.data.data_set.DataSet and xarray. The conversion from xarray format to QCoDeS is more robust in reordering the coordinates.
  The dataset attributes label and unit are now converted as well. (#4011`)

Improved Drivers:

• Fixed issue #4121 of setting the mode of the Keithley 6500 by adding single quotes around the mode value in the set_cmd string. (#4122)
• Add db/phase sweep parameter for rohde_schwarz ZNB driver (#4139)
• Add polar parameter to Keysight PNA to fetch the data using the polar format.
  This reduces the measurement time; instead of pulling magnitude and phase separately,
  we now get all complex data points in a single trace. (#4182)

0.33.0 - March 2022 (2022-03-09)

New:

• Added a function qcodes.dataset.get_guids_by_run_spec to look up dataset guids
  from run specficiations. This replaces the now deprecated semi-public method
  get_guids_from_run_spec. It has a better handling of connections and more filtering options matching
  load_by_run_spec. (#3863)
• A new set of validators MultiTypeAnd and MultiTypeOr that allows combination of
  other validators with And and Or were added. For backwards compatibility the existing
  MultiType validator takes a combiner argument defaulting to Or. (#3917)

Improved:

• Fixed a typo in legacy PyqtGraph plot preventing correct handling of custom units.
  Regression from 0.32.0 (#3773)
• The warning triggered when a parameter is added to the snapshot incorrectly has been improved to include the
  name of the full instrument and two levels of stack information. This should make it easier to find the
  problematic parameter. (#3884)
• Development versions of QCoDeS are now formatted as
  {version}.dev{distance}+{branch}{vcs}{rev}.dirty
  e.g. 0.32.0.dev14+name.of.branch.gxxxxx(.dirty)
  rather than "{version}+{distance}.{vcs}{rev}". This is
  done since pip in some cases considers the later equal to the released
  version and include more info to let you easily identify the
  branch installed from. Note that due to limitations in characters
  in version numbers /_- are normalized to . e.g. a branch named
  myname/my_branch-name becomes myname.my.branch.name in the
  version number. (#3890)
• ChannelTuple now has a repr that correctly identifies it as a ChannelTuple
  and not a ChannelList (#3911)
• Parameter.unit is now a settable property rather than an attribute.
  This should have few implications for user facing code but makes it possible
  to do the same in a parameter subclass implementing validation or other functionality
  as needed. (#3929)
• Metadata added after DataSet export to a netcdf file is now also added
  to that exported netcdf file (unless the exported netcdf file has been moved
  to a new location and set_netcdf_location was not called with that new
  location of the file) (#3932)
• In the interactive widget the total time of a run is now correctly calculated as
  end-time - start-time not the other way around. (#3944)
• Loading a 2 or higher dimentional qcodes dataset back from a netcdf file has been corrected to
  show the dataset in the correct shape.
  QCoDeS dataset are now always written to netcdf files from the cache with the same order of axis as in memory. (#3945)
• Datasets now correctly preserve the shape information when exported to another database. (#3956)
• Functions and classes marked deprecated with the QCoDes Deprecation decorator will now trigger
  warnings that reflect where they are called from and not the location of the deprecation decorator. (#3959)

Improved Drivers:

• AMI430 3D magnet power supply driver: restore ramp rates of individual magnet
  axes after simultaneous ramp via calling wait_while_all_axes_ramping or
  automatically if block_during_ramp is True. (#3885)
• Update the Keysight Infiniium oscilloscope driver to use ParameterWithSetpoints and also make the driver
  work without needing to run prepare_curvedata before measurement. Measurement subsystem is updated to be
  channel aware so it is possible to run measurements on multiple channels in a single qcodes measurement.
  For multiple traces, added the option to control automatic sweeping, similar to the N52xx driver. We can
  now take data from multiple channels with a single digitize. (#3916)
• Fix baud rate of QDevil and QDev QDac's to be 460800 (#3931)
• The Zurich instrument driver stubs in qcodes.instrument_drivers.zurich_instruments have been updated
  to use the 0.3 version of zhinst-qcodes (#3969)
• Fixed a typo that prevented initialization of Agilent 34400A (#3981)

0.32.0 - January 2022 (2022-01-24)

Breaking Changes:

• The qcodes.version module deprecated and no longer imported by default e.g. if you want to use it you will need
  to explicitly import qcodes.version. It is recommended to use qcodes.__version__ as an alternative. (#3762)
• IPython measurement magic (Special command staring with % for use in IPython) using the legacy
  loop is no longer enabled by default.
  To enable it set the corresponding config value (core.register_magic) in your qcodesrc.json config file to true. (#3764)
• The import_legacy_api config option has been deprecated and will be removed in a future release. (#3781)

New:

• An abstract instrument (An instrument with one or more abstract parameters) will now raise at
  instrument creation time preventing such an instrument from being created.
  This makes it easier to define interfaces that multiple instruments must implement.
  See here <../examples/writing_drivers/abstract_instruments.ipynb>__ for examples of how to use
  this. (#3718)

• Improve the Keithley 2600 SMU calibration routine and make it
  a standalone executable function (#3783)

• Add ArraySweep sweep class for use with dond function
  for sweeping parameters on arbitrary arrays of values (#3847)

• The instrument channel container ChannelList has been split into a immutable ChannelTuple
  and a mutable ChannelList. The ChannelList class has gained a to_channel_tuple method.
  The lock method which locks a ChannelList has been retained but we do expect to deprecate
  this in the future.

  All drivers in QCoDeS have been updated to either use a ChannelTuple or a unlocked
  ChannelList as it makes sense.

  Furthermore, the ChannelList class now implements the full
  collections.abc.MutableSequence interface behaving like a python list. (#3851)

Improved:

• Only register an Instrument in the list of connected instruments if the connection
  was successful. This change allows connections to be retried with the same name
  if the first attempt fails. (#3696)
• Fixed a bug with import_legacy_api config option which would trigger a circular import error. (#3781)
• Instances of InstrumentModule (and therfor their subclass InstrumentChannel) are now accessible via
  the Instrument.instrument_modules dict on an instrument in addition to the Instrument.submodules dict
  which combines them with instances of ChannelList. (#3834)
• ChannelList now implements the full collections.abc.Sequence interface.
  This also means that isinstance(mychannelist, Sequence) is True (#3835)
• Inserting into a ChannelList now correctly keeps the internal mapping up to date ensuring that
  get_channel_by_name works correctly. (#3838)
• InstrumentChannel now subclasses a new class InstrumentModule to clarify that instrument modules may
  serve other purposes than being channels. At the moment InstrumentModule and InstrumentChannel are identical.
  The type hints have been updated to clarify that only subclasses of InstrumentModule and ChannelLists
  are allowed submodules. (#3840)
• Empty ChannelTuples/Lists now correctly raise an attribute error when trying
  to get a non existing attribute. Previously they would raise an IndexError. (#3856)

Improved Drivers:

• Changed the value mapping of channel_selection on the AlazarTech ATS9440
  driver to fix all the combinations where channel D is involved. (#3802)
• The VISA version of the AMI driver has been improved to more robustly handle flaky communication. (#3833)
• Added a VISA version of the AMI430 driver. This is expected to be more robust with communication issues than the
  IP version of the driver. This driver exists alongside the IP version as
  qcodes.instrument_drivers.american_magnetics.AMI430_visa.py::AMI430. (#3842)

0.31.0 - December 2021 (2021-12-20)

Improved:

• Do not apply offset or scale when getting a DelegateParameter and source is
  uninitialized (its value is None) to prevent a TypeError being raised. Closes
  #3653 (#3662)
• get_parameter_data for an empty dataset now correctly
  returns a dict of dicts of empty numpy arrays consistent
  with how data is normally returned. Previously, this returned an
  empty dict. (#3682)

New Drivers:

• Adds a driver for the PNA N5222B (#3683)

Improved Drivers:

• AMI430 magnet power supply: fix switch heater parameters that return 0 or 1 as a string (#3650)
• Adds CW mode to PNA 52xx (#3683)
• Update N52xx driver to fix warnings on initialization
  related to not passing **kwargs in trace parameters (closes #3687).
  PNA traces updated to use ParameterWithSetpoints as base instead of
  ArrayParameter. (#3688)
• Add example notebook for R&S SGS100A RF source. (#3680)

v0.30.1

QCoDeS 0.30.1 (2021-12-03)

Relax type assertions for DataSet timestamps so that if in the database they are written as integers, as opposed to floats, a DataSet can still be loaded (#3644)

QCoDeS 0.30.0

QCoDeS 0.30.0 (2021-11-23)
New:

• A new DataSet type DataSetInMem has been added. This allows users to meassure without writing raw data to an sqlite database as well as to load netcdf files into a QCoDeS dataset. See here and here. (#3094)

• Added function get_channel_by_name to ChannelList class to get or or more channels in a ChannelList by name. (#3431)

• The changelog for upcoming changes in the next release is now automatically build from fragments as part of the documentation. (#3451)

Improved:

• The QcoDeS monitor can now be launched directly from a console using by running qcodes-monitor(.exe) (#3475)

• dond avoids setting setpoint parameters with values that are already set. This significantly improves the performance of the dond function in multi-dimensional measurements. (#3534)

• doNd functions now manually wait the delay between setpoints instead of using parameters post_delay attribute. This change prevents unintentional slow downs in measurements when the step delay of a setpoint parameter is considerably lower than the delay between measurement step points that passed into doNd functions. (#3576)

• It is now possible to configure the name of an exported files to include elements such as guid, sample_name and experiment_name. The default format has changed to include the captured_run_id and guid. (#3586)

Improved Drivers:

• Tektronix AWG70000 add support for 70001B and 70002B models. (#3438)

• Added support for flags (auxiliary outputs) for Tektronix AWG70000 sequences (#3450)

• The Galil documentation is now correctly included in the QCoDeS docs (#3452)

• Improved the drivers for Keysight N51x1 and N51x3 signal generators by:

  1. Adding explicit support for N5173B
  2. Fixing the power range of N5183B
  3. Fixing the frequency range options for N51x1 (#3555)

Under the hood:
*The QCoDeS changelog is now being build using towncrier. (#3397)

v0.30.0.dev0

A prerelease to test the automatic release