Export

The recordings and associated metadata such as the species, temperature, notes and other can be exported for further processing.

Recording files (WAV, XML, BRA, PNG)

All the recording data files of a project can be exported (copied) to a specified location e.g. for sharing or backup reasons. Use the export wizard to do that:

_images/ExportWizard.png

  1. In the project tab, select desired recordings (Ctrl + A for all).

  2. In the menu or context menu (right click) choose Export -> Files….

  3. Setup export parameters, select the file types to export. Click Next to continue.

  4. Select a destination folder. Click Browse to choose a folder. Click Next to continue.

  5. Review the export summary and click Apply to start the export process.

GUANO Metadata

To embed metadata directly in the WAV files in GUANO-Format, use the export wizard (see above) and check “Add GUANO” in the export parameters.

CSV

CSV (Comma Separated Values, Spreadsheet, MS Excel, LibreOffice Calc, …) files can be generated.

  1. In the project tab, select desired recordings (Ctrl + A for all).

  2. In the menu or context menu (right click) choose Export -> to CSV….

  3. Select filename and destination path.

  4. A new file with the export data is generated.

Tip

What fields to export and its order for the CSV export can be configured to meet your needs. See Project settings for more information.

In addition, the call lists can be exported as CSV. Select the calls to export and the choose ‘Export’ in the context menu (right click) of the respective list.

Tip

To quickly export to a spreadsheet application (e.g. Excel), just copy/paste the data from the lists. Select recordings or calls in the list, copy (Ctrl+C) and paste in Excel (Ctrl+V).

Statistics

Various statistical data can be exported. It is possible to export a graph as image or to create tabular data in csv format. Right-click a graph to export it.

_images/meta_stats_export.png

Export bat activity 1

Bat activity export can be customized to fit your needs. The simplest form would probably be just a list of calls per minute, as it is displayed in the graph. To do that, choose Export Activity as shown above, enter a file name and location and press Save. Leave the export settings as defaults in the following dialog and press OK to create the CSV-file.

_images/ExportActivity.png

You can also create a table for example with recordings, aggregated per species and hour by changing the export settings. Choose aggregate recordings, enter the time interval 3600s and check group by species to do that.

_images/ExportActivityGraph.png

Tip

To export frequency distribution (over time), use the Export Frequency functions of the Frequency and the Frequency/Time graphs.

Year activity diagram

To create the well known year activity diagrams, check Add night time values in the export parameters to add the required data to the CSV. Of course this works best if the project contains data over multiple days. To get whole year diagrams just concatenate the rows of multiple CSV. In the spreadsheet tool of your choice (Excel, Calc) you can then easily create the chart.

_images/YearActivity.png

An example will illustrate the procedure:

Export bat activity data from BatExplorer:

  1. Choose Export activity from the Statistics Activity charts context menu (right-click).

  2. Choose a location and filename for the CSV to be created.

  3. Setup export parameters as follows:

    _images/ExportYearActivity.png

    • Use Daylight parameters to add sunset and sunrise times for the entered location coordinates.

    • Use Extend time to add additional rows, for days/times were no recordings are available.

    • Use Ignore Zero Rows to reduce data size and ignore rows with no recordings or daylight data.

  4. Click OK. A warning may be displayed if the export period is long and the interval short and therefore a lot of rows need to be processed. Ignore it.

  5. Wait for the processing to be finished. It may take some time.

  6. Repeat the steps above if your data is stored in multiple projects.

Create chart with LibreOffice Calc:

  1. Import the CSV into Calc. Check Detect special numbers in order to import time values correctly. If you exported multiple CSVs, append the data to one big table.

  2. Select the columns NightOfYear, TimeOfNight, Sunset and Sunrise.

  3. Add a new chart.

  4. Choose the chart type X-Y (scatter).

  5. X-Axis is NightOfYear, Y-Axis is TimeOfNight.

  6. Click Finish to create the chart.

  7. Modify the Y-Axis, e.g. Reverse direction, set Interval to 01:00 hour, Minimum to -09:00, Maximum to 09:00, Numbers Format to HH:MM.

  8. Modify the X-Axis, e.g. set Minimum to 1, Maximum to 365, Interval to 31, Positioning, Cross other axis to End, Numbers Format to Date (MMMM).

  9. Modify the Series, e.g. set Marker size and Colour.

Export KML/GPX

Geodata files of the recordings can be generated. Data can be exported in KML (Google Earth) or GPX tracks (GPS Exchange Format) format. The location (GPS coordinates) data is used to create track points/placemarks. Metadata like recording name or species is added if available.

  1. In the project tab, select desired recordings (Ctrl + A for all).

  2. In the menu or context menu (right click) choose Export -> to GPX/KML….

  3. Select filename, destination path and file type.

  4. A new file with the export data is generated.

GIS (Geographic information system) software

The data of the recordings like species, temperature, notes etc. can be processed in a geographic information system (GIS). To do this export the data as CSV file (Comma Separated Values, Excel) or KML file (Google Earth), see above.

An example will illustrate the procedure with QGIS.

Export data from BatExplorer:

  1. Setup the fields to export: Menu Project -> Project settings -> Export Tab.

    The coordinates (longitude, latitude) must be exported.

  2. Select recordings and export to CSV (see above).

  3. A file is produced which contains the information in addition to the coordinates.

Import data into QGIS:

  1. Menu Layer -> Add Layer -> Add delimited text layer…

  2. Browse for the previously created CSV file.

  3. If the coordinates fields were not found automatically, assign the appropriate fields (X = Longitude, Y = Latitude, Point coordinates) or tick the box to set the decimal separator to comma.

  4. Load the data with OK.

  5. Assign the coordinate system (WGS84 or CH1903) depending on the exported fields.

  6. A new layer is added with one point per recording. Use the layer properties to adjust symbols, colours, text etc.

_images/QGIS.png
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Not available in certain editions