Playback & Scrubbing
Overview
The timeline is the central control for navigating through time-correlated data. All panels synchronize to the timeline - scrubbing the timeline updates every visible image, graph, and annotation simultaneously.
Timeline Controls
The timeline bar sits at the bottom of the Nexus window. It contains:
| Element | Description |
|---|---|
| Play / Pause button | Start or pause continuous playback |
| Stop button | Stop playback and return to the start |
| Repeat button | Choose a replay mode - play once, or loop the timeline, the visible range, or the selection |
| Speed selector | Choose or enter a custom playback speed |
| Zoom controls | Zoom In, Zoom Out, Fit (show full range), and Reset buttons |
| Sync toggle | Enable signal sync mode for aligning signals by dragging |
| Scrubber | Vertical green cursor line that can be dragged to any time |
| Signal sparklines | Miniature graphs showing signal values over the full time range |
| Notes track | Visual markers and bars for timestamp and timespan notes; click the + next to the cursor to add a note |
Scrubbing
Drag the timeline cursor to move to any point in your experiment. All panels update in real time - images change frame, graphs move their cursor, and annotation values refresh.
You can also click anywhere on the timeline track area to jump directly to that time.
Playback
Press Play (or the Space bar) to start continuous playback. Nexus advances through the data at the selected speed, updating all panels simultaneously.
| Control | Action |
|---|---|
| Space | Play / Pause |
Replay Modes
By default playback runs to the end of the visible range and stops. Click the Repeat button next to the playback controls to loop instead:
| Mode | Behaviour |
|---|---|
| Off | Play once to the end of the visible range, then stop |
| Repeat full timeline | Loop the entire experiment, regardless of the current zoom |
| Repeat visible range | Loop only the range currently visible on the timeline |
| Repeat selection | Loop only the selected range |
The Repeat button is highlighted while a replay mode is active. Changing the mode during playback takes effect immediately.
Zooming or panning does not move the cursor, so it can end up outside the range you are looping. Playback keeps the cursor inside the active range: if it sits before the range, playback starts at the beginning of the range; if it sits after it, playback loops straight back to the start.
Repeat selection can only be chosen while a range is selected. If you clear the selection while it is active, the replay mode returns to Off.
Selection
Hold Shift and drag on the time axis to select a time region. The selection is highlighted with a blue tint. Drag the edges of the selection to adjust its boundaries.
When a selection is active, three buttons appear:
- Zoom to selection — zooms the timeline to show only the selected range
- + — creates a timespan note from the selected range
- Clear selection (×) — removes the selection
A selection can also be replayed on a loop - see Repeat selection.
Signal Sparklines
Each signal added to the timeline is represented by a colour-coded sparkline that shows the signal’s trend over the entire experiment. Click a sparkline to select the corresponding signal.