The “GWSDAT options” dialogue box, which appears when “GWSDAT analysis” is selected, allows the user to select the time interval between spatiotemporal model output plots. The pre-defined user options are “None”, “Monthly” or “Quarterly”: the model sets the start and end dates for the intervals by working backwards from the most recent sampling date. Concentration contour plots are generated by exporting data from the spatiotemporal model at the end of each specified time interval.
The “GWSDAT options” dialogue box also controls the handling of groundwater elevation data. If no aggregation (i.e. “None”) is selected then the software will attempt to generate a groundwater contour plan for every date in the input dataset. In practice, however, groundwater elevation surveys are often spread over a number of days and so this approach is likely to generate incomplete contour plots. If “monthly” or “quarterly” aggregation selected the software collates daily groundwater elevation data into monthly or quarterly blocks, thereby increasing the size of the dataset available for piezometric contouring.
