Geochemical Data Toolkit (GCDkit)
for Windows

Written by V. Janoušek, C. M. Farrow, V. Erban & J. Šmíd

Archive of GCDkit versions and accessories

GCDkit ver. 2.3

Released May 11, 2008, built under R 2.7.0

New features in GCDkit 2.3 :

• Profiler - a routine for plotting of single/multiple profiles with x axis being set to distance or an arbitrary parameter (such as concentration of an element of choice or depth)
• New classification diagrams:
  • SiO2 vs FeOt/MgO plot of Miyashiro (1974) for distinguishing tholeiitic from calc-alkaline igneous rocks
  • Co-Th plot of Hastie et al. (2007) for subdivision of igneous-arc rocks thought to be a more robust replacement for the SiO2 vs. K2O plot of Peccerillo & Taylor (1976)
  • Nb/Y vs Zr/Ti plot modified by Pearce (1996)
  • multicationic B-A plot (originally by Debon and Le Fort 1983) with fields for various types of peraluminous rocks (Villaseca et al. 1998)
• New geotectonic diagrams:
  • classification of granitoids after Frost et al (2001)
  • set of plots by Schandl and Gorton (2002) designed to decipher the geotectonic setting of felsic volcanic suites, specifically those associated with the volcanogenic massive sulphide (VMS) deposits
  • binary plots of Whalen et al. (1987) to distinguish the A-type granitoids
• Plot editing: menu Item Add|reservoirs/minerals enables overplotting of compositions of selected geochemical reservoirs (from the file 'reservoirs.data') or selected rock-forming minerals (from the file 'idealmins.data')
• Added agpaitic index (Norms|Miscellany)
• New plugin - isocon.r - isocon plotting after Grant (1986)
• Plugin Sr.Nd.r can now produce diagrams involving delta values (in the datafile labeled e.g.'delta7Li'), such as element-delta values, stripplots, boxplots.

Bug fixes, performance improvements:

• Upon saving a plain text file, the values which are not available are not replaced by '-1'
• Small changes for compatibility with the R version 2.7.0
• Problems with searching patterns containing the substring "OR" fixed
• The programme now can load negative numbers or zeros (useful for stable isotope data in delta notation) and handle them correctly
• Formatting of delta values for plotting
• Implemented are graphical progress bars for norm calculations
• The command history now works fine, previous commands can be browsed through/invoked using the cursor arrows and ENTER
• Plotting symbols and colours in saved diagrams are now preserved
• Routine for annotation axis labels checked and corrected
• Fixed was the routine for selecting variables, exact matches are now prefered over the partial ones

GCDkit ver. 2.2

Released February 1, 2007, built under R 2.4.1

New features in GCDkit 2.2 :

• If the data file contains negative values or values preceeded by lesser-than sign ('<'), the user can replace them by half of the detection limit specified. Otherwise, these values are treated as if they have not been determined at all.
• (technical) Changed names many of the functions (all of those which contained dot) to make the package compliant with the S3 methods.

Bug fixes, performance improvements:

• If not specified in the data file, the ⁸⁷Rb/⁸⁷Sr and ¹⁴⁷Sm/¹⁴⁴Nd are calculated from elemental concentrations of Rb and Sr or Sm and Nd, respectively.
• Mode - printed correctly the results but failed to return them for instance for subsequent Copying to clipboard.
• Correct formatting of subscripts in spiderplots.
• Selecting subset by the specified label yielded wrong results.
• Correct colours in multiple spiderplots by groups.
• Problems with empty items in specifications of groups, colours or symbols.
• Removed unwanted scientific notation that appeared in some diagrams (such as Winchester and Floyd).
• Numerous small bug fixes.

GCDkit ver. 2.1.1

Released April 1, 2006, built under R 2.2.1

GCDkit 2.1.1 brought no new features, just bug fixes and a number of cosmetic changes to many functions. ):

• Loading data with duplicated sample names is now possible from XLS, DBF and MDB files - the names are replaced by sequence numbers, if necessary. This is still to be implemented for text files and pasting from clipboard, though.
• Appending samples with duplicated names is now possible - the names are replaced by sequence numbers, if necessary.
• Misleading error message returned by export to XLS and MDB via ODBC removed.
• Missing data columns (Q or F) are now allowed in the QAPF diagram. The manual entry has been revised.
• Mismatch in names of ratios calculated for normalized REE contents (spider.r)
• Small amendments to the SiO₂-K₂O diagram of Peccerillo and Taylor (1973)
• Nasty Bug in editing labels as factor
• Many unnecessary warnings removed

GCDkit ver. 2.1

Released Jan 10, 2006, built under R 2.21

Selected new features in GCDkit 2.1 (see complete list):

• Fundamentally revised, less cluttered menu structure
• Box-percentile plots (as an option in spider boxplots)
• Plugin tetrad.r calculating the magnitude of the lanthanide tetrad effect following Irber (1999)
• Loading files from web-based geochemical databases GEOROC and PETDB
• Loading *.peg files used by PetroGraph (Petrelli et al. 2005) (library RODBC required).
• QAPF plot (Streckeisen 1974 and 1978) and O'Connor's (1965) Ab-An-Or diagram
• Remaining plugins (saturation, SrNd, tetrad...) move to a separate menu.
• Multiple plots by groups can handle spiderplots
• Much improved output to HTML
• Pearce et al. (1984)- boundaries slightly shifted in some diagrams (in particular Nb-Y)
• numerous bug fixes and further functionality improvenments

GCDkit ver. 2.0

Released 1 May, 2005, built under R 2.10

Selected new features in GCDkit 2.00 (see complete list):

• GCDkit is internally stored as a R package that can be loaded by the "library" command. This means that the system does not reside in a memory image (.Rdata) file any more, which is now free to use.
• Direct data loading of Excel, Access and DBF files, as well as from popular geochemical packages NewPet, IgPet and MinPet, results export into Excell and Access (library RODBC required)
• All the character values in columns recognized as numeric (element or oxide symbol in the first row) are assumed to be typos and are replaced by NA.
• Spiderplots (for selected samples) are now Figaro compatible. This means that the plots can be annotated, colours,scaling and other parameters changed and individual samples/patterns identified
• Improved ternary plotting, option of plotting ticks in custom ternary plots. Better implementation of Figaro/Plot editing. While zooming, plot window boundaries are shown.
• Added new anomaly plots (former peterplots) and binary boxplots, classification plots of Middlemost (1994), stripplots by groups
• numerous bug fixes and further functionality improvenments

GCDkit ver. 1.2

Released 19 May, 2004, built under R 1.81

New features in GCDkit 1.2 included:

• changes to graphics (loading/saving Figaro-compatible graphs),
• more intelligent spider plots with a possibility of normalization by a selected sample or sample average,
• improvements to Harker plots,
• a new plugin advanced_plotting for frequency plots,
• extensions to data management (more flexible sample selections,regular expressions now allowed in Boolean searches, defining groups by outlining polygons on Figaro-compatible plots).
• numerous bug fixes and improved error handling

Last changes: May 11, 2008