The File Open Command allows the selection if either a listmode or histogram data file for display. A dialog box is presented for directory and file selection. Once the file header is read, the user is presented with a dialog box showing display options for the data, overlay for histograms, for example. If the display window is a dotplot or contour, the user then selects which parameters are to be read into the display.
Drag and Drop
Once a Graphical Window has been created, it is possible to use the Drag & Drop capability of Windows 3.1 and the File Manager to read new data files. Select a valid FCS data file file from within the File Manager, drag the icon to WinMDI, and drop the object in the desired Histogram, Dotplot, or Contour window.
WinMDI Version 1.0 and later reads both forward and reverse byte order FCS 1.0 and FCS 2.0 data files. Files generated by either Becton Dickinson's FACScan Research Software, or LYSYS II, or by other FCS1.0 compliant programs ought to be properly read by WinMDI. Please report any file I/O errors to trotter@scripps.edu via Internet email. Since only a limited number of different FCS files have been tested and problems may arise with various untested "FCS" file formats, reporting errors will help the application programmer to make WinMDI more useful.