DarSIA GUI Guide#

A from-scratch, beginner-friendly tutorial for the DarSIA GUI, for people picking up DarSIA for the first time. Every TOML snippet is taken from sample_config.toml (next to this guide), the running example throughout.

Warning

This guide is a work in progress. The screenshots are placeholders and will be replaced with real captures of the app.

Note

sample_config.toml is a complete, realistic FluidFlower configuration; only the file-system paths (/path/to/experiment/...) are placeholders. To use it on your own experiment, edit the paths in [data], [protocols], [labeling], [facies] and [depth], and re-run Setup and Calibration from scratch (the crop corners and calibration values are specific to one rig, camera and lighting).

Who this is for#

You know Python and are comfortable editing a text file, but you have never opened DarSIA before. You want to go from “installed DarSIA” to “produced a mass map from a FluidFlower image” without reading the source code first.

How the guide is organized#

  1. Getting started — install, launch the GUI, tour the main window, and the five-phase mental model (Setup → Calibration → Analysis → Helper → Comparison).

  2. Quickstart walkthrough — the core tutorial. Load sample_config.toml and walk through every tab with screenshots and the matching config snippet.

  3. Core concepts — the ideas that make DarSIA configs click: config layering, data selectors, the ROI registry, color embeddings, and the format registry.

  4. Configuration reference — an annotated, field-by-field reference, grounded in sample_config.toml.

  5. Advanced analysis — segmentation styling, thresholding, finger detection, expert-knowledge ROI constraints, and the auto/manual color calibration modes.

  6. Troubleshooting & FAQ — known issues and the questions beginners hit first.

Prerequisites#

  • Python 3.12+ and uv

  • DarSIA installed (see Getting started)

  • A FluidFlower image set — the walkthrough uses sample_config.toml, but the same steps apply to your own data once you swap the paths in [data]

Start with Getting started.