The Plaque Simulator Master Data Folder
MasterData

Plaque Simulator organizes all of its support files in a master folder (aka subdirectory). This folder MUST reside in the same folder as the Plaque Simulator application itself. The default organization of this folder is illustrated below.

When Plaque Simulator is launched it obtains the name of its master data folder from its preferences file. If the preference setting is empty, the default name of "Plaque Simulator Data" is used. While it is NOT recommended, you may permanently or temporarily select another folder to be the master data folder. Using the MacOS Finder, create a new folder in the same folder as the Plaque Simulator application and organize the desired files within it any way you please. Then, relaunch Plaque Simulator, go to the Files & Folders preferences dialog, indicate which folder is to be the new master data folder, click the Save button, and exit the preferences dialog.

When Plaque Simulator is launched it recursively scans its master data folder folder, and all folders within it, for recognizable files such as physics, plaques, radionuclide inventory, isodose legends and colors, and builds menus which organize cached links to those files.

While recursively searching the master data folder for linkable files, Plaque Simulator ignores the contents of folders whose names are enclosed in parentheses (). The folder (Hidden Support Files) hides all kind of interesting support, optional and educational materials related to Plaque Simulator. This provides a way for the program to launch quickly without having to search, for instance, through all the many hundreds of supplemental and user guide files. You can use this mechanism to hide files, such as experimental plaque designs, that you don't want to dispose of, but also don't want to appear in the menus.

Each menu of linked files also provides an Update option which rescans the master data folder and updates the menu to reflect changes made since Plaque Simulator was launched.

DataFolder
  • When the master data folder is parsed, an array of plaque (.iplq6) file URLs is created. This array is sorted according to the PS file naming conventions (e.g. files with a -r tag are rentable) to populate the Plaque Files and Rental Plaques menus.
  • If isodose (.idos6) or color (.iclr6) legend files are found (up to a limit of 64) their names are entered into the Legend Files and Color Files menus and URLs are cached for rapid access.
  • The file PSclinics.sqlite is an SQL database of your institutional team presets.
  • The file PSdatabase.sqlite is an SQL database of your radionuclide source inventory.
  • The file PSlicenses.sqlite is an SQL database of your user licenses.
  • The file PSlog.txt saves a log of recent PS activity.
  • The file PSpatients.sqlite is an SQL database of patient treatment plan file URLs and searchable parameters.
  • The file PSpeople.sqlite is an SQL database of institutional team contact members (name, email, phone).
  • The file README ADMIN.txt contains some default administrative password information.