Help with Mathematical Transformations

The data system allows you to define new field names using values from the existing data. For example, if a data object provided wind speed information in the form of the pair of values nwind and ewind (north wind and east wind), you can define the wind speed as

wspeed=(nwind*nwind+ewind*ewind)^.5

where the "^" operator means "raise to the power". In this case, we need the square root of the sum of the squares of each wind component.

When you are done entering the formula (or formulas, separated by a comma), touch the Enter or Return key. The data are relisted, with the new field name and values added as a new column of data to the right of the existing table.


Last modified: March 5, 1997