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Changelog

All notable changes to TraceKit will be documented in this file.

The format is based on Keep a Changelog, and this project adheres to Semantic Versioning.

Unreleased

No unreleased changes.

0.1.0 - 2026-01-17

Initial Public Release

TraceKit 0.1.0 is the first public release of the comprehensive signal analysis and reverse engineering toolkit for analog and digital waveforms.

Core Features

Signal Analysis & Measurement

  • Waveform Analysis - Rise/fall time, frequency, duty cycle, overshoot (IEEE 181-2011 compliant)
  • Spectral Analysis - FFT, PSD, spectrograms, wavelets, THD, SNR, SINAD, ENOB (IEEE 1241-2010)
  • Audio Analysis - THD, SNR, SINAD, ENOB, harmonic distortion
  • Power Analysis - AC/DC power, efficiency, ripple, power factor (IEEE 1459-2010)
  • Jitter Analysis - TIE, period jitter, RJ/DJ decomposition (IEEE 2414-2020)
  • Signal Integrity - Eye diagrams, S-parameter analysis, TDR impedance profiling

Protocol Support (16+ Decoders)

Serial Protocols: - UART, SPI, I2C, 1-Wire, I2S, Manchester encoding

Automotive: - CAN, CAN-FD, LIN, FlexRay, OBD-II (54 PIDs), J1939 (154 PGNs), UDS (ISO 14229)

Debug Interfaces: - JTAG, SWD

Network: - USB, HDLC

Features: - Auto-detection and baud rate recovery - Checksum validation (XOR, SUM, CRC-8/16/32) - DTC database (210 codes, SAE J2012)

Reverse Engineering

  • SignalBuilder API - Fluent API for composable signal generation (analog waveforms, protocol signals, noise/impairments)
  • Protocol Inference - CRC polynomial recovery, state machine learning (L* algorithm), field boundary detection
  • Pattern Recognition - Counter patterns, toggle patterns, sequence detection
  • CAN Bus RE - Message discovery, signal extraction, DBC file generation
  • Complete RE Workflow - 8-step automated reverse engineering pipeline for unknown digital signals

Convenience APIs

  • quick_spectral() - One-call spectral analysis returning all IEEE 1241 metrics
  • auto_decode() - Unified protocol detection and decoding (UART/SPI/I2C/CAN)
  • smart_filter() - Intelligent filtering with automatic noise source detection
  • reverse_engineer_signal() - Complete reverse engineering workflow for unknown signals

Discovery & Analysis

  • Signal Characterization - Automatic signal type detection (analog/digital/mixed)
  • Anomaly Detection - Statistical anomaly identification
  • Quality Assessment - Data quality validation and metrics

File Format Support

Oscilloscopes: - Tektronix WFM, Rigol WFM, Siglent, generic binary

Logic Analyzers: - Sigrok (.sr), VCD (Value Change Dump)

Network Captures: - PCAP, PCAPNG with full protocol parsing (dpkt integration)

Automotive: - Vector BLF/ASC, ASAM MDF/MF4, DBC, CSV

Scientific Data: - TDMS (LabVIEW), HDF5, NumPy, WAV, CSV

RF/Network: - Touchstone S-parameters (.s1p, .s2p, etc.)

Signal Processing

  • Filtering - IIR, FIR, Butterworth, Chebyshev, Bessel, Elliptic filters
  • Triggering - Edge, pattern, pulse width, glitch, runt, window triggers
  • Arithmetic - Add, subtract, differentiate, integrate, FFT operations
  • Math Operations - RMS, mean, peak detection, envelope, correlation

EMC & Compliance Testing

  • Standards Support - CISPR 32, IEC 61000-3-2, IEC 61000-4-2/4-4, MIL-STD-461G
  • EMI Analysis - Conducted/radiated emissions, immunity testing
  • EMI Fingerprinting - Automatic emission source identification
  • Limit Testing - Automated compliance checking with limit masks

Professional Features

  • Report Generation - PDF, HTML, Markdown, CSV exports
  • Session Management - Workspace persistence and replay
  • Batch Processing - Multi-file analysis with progress tracking
  • Visualization - Waveform plotting, eye diagrams, spectrograms, constellation diagrams
  • Memory Management - Large file handling with streaming support
  • Comparison Tools - Golden waveform comparison, mask testing

Demonstrations

31 comprehensive demos covering all major features:

Comprehensive Demos (8): 1. Waveform Analysis - 7 analysis sections (measurements, spectral, power, statistics, filtering, protocols, math) 2. Protocol Decoding - UART, SPI, I2C multi-protocol with auto-detection 3. UDP Packet Analysis - Traffic metrics, payload analysis, pattern detection, field inference 4. Automotive - CAN, OBD-II, UDS, J1939, LIN, FlexRay protocols with DBC generation 5. Mixed-Signal - Clock recovery, jitter analysis, IEEE 2414-2020 compliance 6. Spectral Compliance - IEEE 1241-2010 validation (THD, SNR, SINAD, ENOB, SFDR) 7. Signal Reverse Engineering - 5-phase RE workflow 8. EMC Compliance - CISPR 32, IEC 61000 compliance testing

Serial Protocols (6): - JTAG, SWD, USB, 1-Wire, Manchester, I2S

Automotive Protocols (2): - LIN, FlexRay

Timing & Jitter (3): - IEEE 181 pulse measurements, bathtub curves, DDJ/DCD analysis

Power Analysis (2): - DC-DC efficiency, ripple analysis

Signal Integrity (3): - Setup/hold timing, TDR impedance, S-parameters

Protocol Inference (3): - CRC reverse engineering, Wireshark dissector generation, state machine learning

Advanced Inference (3): - Bayesian inference, protocol DSL, active learning

Complete Workflows (3): - Network analysis, unknown signal RE, automotive full workflow

File Format I/O (1): - VCD loader

Custom DAQ (3): - Simple, chunked, optimal streaming loaders

Demo Features: - All demos support --data-file CLI argument for loading pre-captured data - Auto-detection of default data from demo_data/ directories - Synthetic generation fallback when no files available - 678.67 MB of generated demo data across 25 files - Validation suite: 30/31 demos passing (96.8% success rate)

Data Loading Feature

  • BaseDemo Enhancement - Added data_file parameter and find_default_data_file() helper
  • Three-tier Loading - CLI override → default file → synthetic fallback
  • Consistent Pattern - All 31 demos follow standardized data loading approach
  • Multiple Formats - NPZ, VCD, BIN, MF4, PCAP support across different demo types

Infrastructure

  • Python 3.12+ Support - Full type hints and modern Python features
  • Dependencies - Optimized core dependencies (removed unused plotly/bokeh, moved reportlab to extras)
  • Testing - 18,083 tests passing, 255 skipped, 10 xfailed (99.6% pass rate)
  • Code Quality - 100% pass rate on all quality checks (ruff, mypy, prettier, markdownlint)
  • Pre-commit Hooks - 21 hooks covering format, lint, security, documentation
  • Pre-push Verification - Full CI simulation with 3-stage verification (95% CI coverage)
  • CI/CD - GitHub Actions with parallel test matrix (Python 3.12/3.13, 8 test groups)
  • Documentation - MkDocs with strict link validation, comprehensive API docs

Standards Compliance

  • IEEE 181-2011 - Pulse measurements (rise/fall time, overshoot, slew rate)
  • IEEE 1057-2017 - Digitizer characterization and timing analysis
  • IEEE 1241-2010 - ADC testing (SNR, SINAD, ENOB, THD, SFDR)
  • IEEE 2414-2020 - Jitter measurements (TIE, period jitter, RJ/DJ decomposition)
  • IEEE 1459-2010 - Power quality measurements
  • CISPR 16 - EMC compliance testing with limit masks
  • IEC 61000 - Electromagnetic compatibility standards
  • MIL-STD-461G - Military EMI/EMC requirements
  • SAE J1939 - Heavy-duty vehicle CAN diagnostics
  • ISO 14229 - Unified Diagnostic Services (UDS)

Installation

pip install tracekit

Optional Dependencies: 

pip install tracekit[all]           # All features
pip install tracekit[automotive]    # Automotive protocols
pip install tracekit[visualization] # Plotting support
pip install tracekit[reporting]     # PDF report generation

Quick Start

import tracekit as tk

# Load and analyze a waveform
trace = tk.load("capture.wfm")
print(f"Rise time: {tk.rise_time(trace):.2e} s")

# Quick spectral analysis
metrics = tk.quick_spectral(trace, fundamental=1000)
print(f"THD: {metrics.thd_db:.1f} dB, SNR: {metrics.snr_db:.1f} dB")

# Auto-decode protocol
result = tk.auto_decode(trace)
print(f"Protocol: {result.protocol}, Frames: {len(result.frames)}")

# Generate test signals
signal = (tk.SignalBuilder(sample_rate=1e6, duration=0.01)
    .add_sine(frequency=1000)
    .add_noise(snr_db=40)
    .build())

# Reverse engineer unknown signal
result = tk.workflows.reverse_engineer_signal(trace)
print(result.protocol_spec)

Known Issues

  • USB demo has pre-existing PID validation bug (not related to data loading feature)
  • GitHub Actions CI requires billing resolution (code is fully verified locally)

Contributors

  • lair-click-bats (primary author)
  • Claude Code (AI development assistance)

License

MIT License - See LICENSE file for details