Some SCOUT objects can read or write data in a very simple format without any header, namely by just using pairs of x- and y-values stored in ASCII files.

An example is the following:

______________________________________________________

1.2        0.234

1.5        0.302

1.9        0.452

0.7        0.332

_______________________________________________________

Since the x-values must not necessarily have equal spacings (as in the example above) a problem arises when an object tries to import such data which requires equidistant x-values (such as object of type 'single data column field'). In this case the following is done:

The pairs of x-y-data are read from the file, then they are sorted by the x-values (starting with the smallest). A 'grid' of equally spaced x-values is created covering the same x-range as the original data and using the same number of data points. Finally the corresponding y-values are calculated by interpolating between the original data.