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Workspaces

Workspaces are a powerful feature in mXrap that allow you to save and restore your complete analysis environment, including all settings, filters, views, and configurations. They enable efficient workflows, facilitate collaboration, and ensure consistency across analysis sessions.

What are Workspaces?​

Workspaces capture the entire state of your mXrap application at a specific moment, including:

  • Window layouts and splits: The arrangement of 3D views, charts, and tables
  • Filter settings: All active filters and their configurations
  • Variable values: Custom variable settings and thresholds
  • Series configurations: Marker styles, colours, sizes, and visibility settings
  • Chart settings: Axis ranges, legends, zoom levels, and display options
  • View orientations: 3D view angles, clipping planes, and survey visibility
  • Panel states: Which panels are open or closed

This comprehensive snapshot allows you to return to exactly where you left off, or share your analysis setup with colleagues.

Why Use Workspaces?​

Save Time and Increase Efficiency​

Workspaces eliminate the need to manually reconfigure your analysis environment every time you open mXrap. Instead of spending time:

  • Splitting windows into your preferred layout
  • Adjusting filters to focus on specific data
  • Customizing marker styles and colours
  • Setting up chart configurations
  • Positioning 3D views

You can simply load a saved workspace and immediately begin your analysis with all settings already configured.

Facilitate Team Collaboration​

Workspaces are excellent tools for communication and collaboration:

  • Share discoveries: Save a workspace showing interesting seismic patterns or anomalies and share it with team members
  • Report issues: When reporting errors or unexpected behavior to ACG support, save a workspace that demonstrates the issue
  • Standardize analysis: Create standard workspaces for routine analyses to ensure consistency across your team
  • Training: Provide new users with pre-configured workspaces that demonstrate best practices

Support Multiple Analysis Workflows​

Different analysis tasks often require different configurations. Workspaces allow you to maintain separate setups for:

  • Daily monitoring and routine checks
  • Detailed event investigations
  • Hazard assessments
  • Production reviews
  • Specific geological zones or mining areas

How to Save a Workspace​

Workspaces menu dropdown showing options for saving and loading workspace settings
Workspaces menu dropdown showing options for saving and loading workspace settings

Step-by-Step Instructions​

  1. Configure your analysis environment with all the settings, filters, views, and layouts you want to preserve

  2. Click the Workspace button located in the top-left corner of the Viewer window

  3. Select "Save Current as Workspace" from the dropdown menu

  4. Choose a location and name for your workspace:

    • Use a descriptive name that clearly indicates the workspace's purpose (e.g., "Magnitude-Time-Analysis", "Daily-Monitoring", "Level-1200-Review")
    • Consider using folders to organise workspaces by user, analysis type, or location
    • Using your initials as a folder name helps keep personal workspaces separate from shared ones

  5. Click OK to save the workspace

How to Load a Workspace​

There are two ways to load a workspace in mXrap:

When opening an application from the Apps window:

  1. Single-click on the application name (e.g., General Analysis) instead of double-clicking
  2. Look at the App Workspaces panel on the right-hand side
  3. Navigate through folders to find your desired workspace
  4. Double-click on the workspace name to open the application with those settings

This method is recommended because it loads the workspace from scratch, ensuring all settings are properly initialised.

Method 2: From Within an Open Application​

If you already have an application open:

  1. Click the Workspace button in the top-left corner of the Viewer window
  2. Navigate through the workspace folders
  3. Double-click on the workspace you want to load

Workspace Features and Tips​

Reset Variables to Defaults​

The Workspaces menu includes a "Reset Variables to Defaults" option that resets all variables and filters to their default values. This is useful when:

  • You want to start fresh without closing and reopening the application
  • You've made many changes and want to return to the baseline configuration
  • You're troubleshooting unexpected behavior

To reset variables:

  1. Open the Workspaces menu (top-left corner)
  2. Click "Reset Variables to Defaults"
  3. All filters and variables will return to their default states

Workspace Storage Location​

Workspaces are stored in the Workspaces folder within your root directory. Each application has its own subfolder:

  • Workspaces/General Analysis/ - General Analysis workspaces
  • Workspaces/Hazard Assessment/ - Hazard Assessment workspaces
  • Workspaces/Damage Mapping/ - Damage Mapping workspaces

This folder structure is automatically created and managed by mXrap.

Sharing Workspaces​

Since workspaces are stored as files in your root folder, they can be shared with colleagues:

  • Within the same site: Workspaces saved in a shared root folder are automatically available to all users
  • Between sites: Copy workspace files from one root folder to another to share configurations across different locations
  • With ACG support: When reporting issues, save a workspace and mention its name to help support staff reproduce your exact setup

Common Use Cases​

Daily Monitoring Workspace​

Create a workspace configured for routine daily checks:

  • 3D view showing the current mining area
  • Magnitude-Time history chart for the last 24 hours
  • Event table filtered to show recent events above threshold
  • Standard marker styles and colours for quick interpretation

Detailed Event Investigation​

Set up a workspace for investigating specific events:

  • Multiple chart views (Magnitude-Time, Apparent Stress, Energy-Moment)
  • Tight date range filters around the event of interest
  • 3D view with appropriate clipping and survey visibility
  • Event table showing detailed source parameters

Hazard Assessment Review​

Configure a workspace for hazard analysis:

  • Frequency-magnitude charts with appropriate date ranges
  • Hazard isosurfaces displayed in 3D view
  • Grid-based analysis results
  • Cumulative energy or moment charts

Training and Demonstration​

Create workspaces that demonstrate specific features or workflows:

  • Clear, uncluttered layouts
  • Well-labeled charts and views
  • Appropriate filters to show relevant data
  • Annotations or notes explaining the setup

Best Practices​

Naming Conventions​

Use clear, descriptive names that indicate:

  • Purpose: What analysis or task the workspace supports
  • Location: Specific mining level or area if applicable
  • Date range: If the workspace is configured for a specific time period
  • User: Personal workspaces should include initials or username

Examples:

  • LM/Mag-Time-Daily
  • Team/Level-1200-Hazard
  • Monitoring/Last-Week-Review
  • ST/Event-Investigation-Template

Regular Maintenance​

Periodically review and clean up your workspaces:

  • Delete outdated or unused workspaces
  • Update workspace names if their purpose changes
  • Reorganise folders as your workflow evolves
  • Archive old workspaces rather than deleting them if they might be useful later

Combining with Other Features​

Workspaces work well in combination with other mXrap features:

  • Filters: Save workspaces with specific filter configurations for different analysis scenarios
  • Grids: Create workspaces with appropriate grids for different mining areas
  • Selections: Save workspaces that include selection boxes for specific event populations
  • Export settings: Configure export dimensions and formats, then save as a workspace for consistent reporting

Troubleshooting​

Workspace Doesn't Load Correctly​

If a workspace doesn't restore your settings as expected:

  1. Check mXrap version: Workspaces created in newer versions may not load properly in older versions
  2. Verify data availability: Ensure all surveys, grids, and data referenced in the workspace are available
  3. Try loading from Apps window: Use Method 1 (from Apps window) instead of loading from within the application
  4. Reset and reconfigure: If problems persist, reset variables to defaults and reconfigure your workspace

Can't Find Saved Workspace​

If you can't locate a workspace you saved:

  1. Check the correct application: Workspaces are application-specific (General Analysis workspaces won't appear in Hazard Assessment)
  2. Look in folders: Navigate through any folder structure you may have created
  3. Check the Workspaces folder: Manually browse the Workspaces folder in your root directory
  4. Verify save location: Ensure you saved to the correct root folder if you have multiple roots

Workspace Conflicts in Shared Environments​

When multiple users share a root folder:

  1. Use personal folders: Create a folder with your initials for personal workspaces
  2. Communicate about shared workspaces: Coordinate with team members before modifying shared workspaces
  3. Create copies: If you want to modify a shared workspace, save it under a new name first
  4. Document shared workspaces: Add notes or descriptions to help others understand the purpose of shared workspaces

Training Resources​

Workspaces are available in every app and are used to save your current settings to be quickly used again at a later date. They are very handy to communicate things you've noticed to other members of your team or even to send errors you've notices to ACG. Keep in mind that workspaces were introduced originally meant to be used only in the short term. We cannot always support workspaces through root upgrades so you might lose workspaces from time-to-time. Try not to rely on them in the long-term or be prepared to occasionally have to recreate them.

This video provides a comprehensive introduction to workspaces, demonstrating how to save and load workspaces, organise them with folders, and use them to improve your mXrap workflow.

  • Filters - Learn about filter configurations that can be saved in workspaces
  • Charts - Understand chart settings that workspaces preserve
  • 3D View - Explore 3D view configurations saved in workspaces
  • Grids - Configure grids that can be included in workspace setups
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