PenInspector

Simple Qt application to inspect data provided by graphics tablet styluses.

Detected Levels

Tablet	Declared	Windows 10 (Ink)	macOS
XPPen Deco LW	8192	~1024	~256

Installation

bypass notarize

The .dmg installer is not notarized. To be able to install and use PenInspector.app from it, you will need to bypass manually the Gatekeeper. Assuming that you've downloaded the .dmg in ~/Downloads, you can bypass the Gatekeeper by running the command bellow in a Terminal window before mounting (double-clicking) the .dmg:

xattr -d com.apple.quarantine ~/Downloads/PenInspector-Installer.dmg

References:

• How to bypass notarize

Usage

• configure your stylus using the Pen Config dock
• select one of your styluses as the active one in the top application toolbar
• draw something with your stylus in the canvas area
• the Pressure Histogram dock will show a histogram with the pressure
• the Pressure History dock will show the actual pressure level as you draw in the canvas area
• copy the chart images to clipboard using Copy Chart buttons from the Pressure Histogram or Pressure History docks' toolbars

Canvas Area

• pen data is received only while inside this area
• use Clear button to clear the canvas area

Pen Config Dock

• set a Name so that you can identify your pen in the top toolbar
• the Pressure Levels is used by the Pressure Histogram to determine possible bucket values (stylus pressure is reported by Qt as a real number between 0.0 and 1.0)
• use the Plus button to add a new config to the end of the config list
• use the Minus button to remove the selected configuration
• when the app starts the first time or finds no configured pen on start, a default pen (XPPen Deco LW) will be created
• for now, the Maximum Tilt Angle is used by the Pen InfoDock to display the tilt

Pen Info Dock

• displays data reported by operating system from the stylus
• tilt angle and tilt rotation values are computed by the application

Pressure Histogram Dock

• shows a histogram (left) and a table with pressure data (right)
• the pressure data table contains:
  • Pressure: the actual pressure value reported by the operating system
  • Level: the level, based on the total number of pressure configured for the current pen
  • Count: how many times this pressure/level was reported
• use the separator between the histogram and the table to set their widths
• use the Copy Chart button to copy the chart to clipboard
• use the Clear button to clear the chart
• set a Window Size to limit the histogram to the a specific data set
  • All will use all pressure data to compute the histogram

Pressure History Dock

• shows a graph with pressure (left) and a table with pressure data (right)
• every time the operating system reports a new pen event, the pressure value is added at the end (right side) of this graph
• the pressure data table contains:
  • Index: the index of the pressure value
  • Pressure: the actual pressure value reported by the operating system
  • Level: the level, based on the total number of pressure configured for the current pen
• use the separator between the histogram and the table to set their widths
• use the Copy Chart button to copy the chart to clipboard
• use the Clear button to clear the chart
• set a Window Size to limit the history to the a specific data set

Copyright (C) 2022 by Ioan Calin Borcoman