QCoDeS [UNRELEASED DRAFT] (2025-09-12)

Breaking Changes:

• Removal of deprecated code

  Removed modules:

  • Removed the deprecated qcodes.instrument_drivers.american_magnetics.AMI430 module. Use AMIModel4303D from qcodes.instrument_drivers.american_magnetics instead.

  • Removed the deprecated qcodes.utils.spyder_utils module containing the add_to_spyder_UMR_excludelist function. This utility was known to not work with latest Spyder versions and was unused in QCoDeS.

  Removed classes:

  • Removed the deprecated AMI430_3D and AMI430 classes from qcodes.instrument_drivers.american_magnetics.AMI430. Use AMIModel4303D and AMIModel430 from qcodes.instrument_drivers.american_magnetics instead.

  • Removed deprecated methods from AMI430SwitchHeater

  • Removed deprecated AMI430_VISA class from ip_to_visa.py.

  • Removed the deprecated ConnectionPlus class from qcodes.dataset.sqlite.connection. Use AtomicConnection class instead.

  • Removed the deprecated AlazarTech_ATS class. Use AlazarTechATS instead.

  • Removed the deprecated WaveformGenerator_33XXX class. Use Keysight33xxx instead.

  • Removed the following deprecated Keysight classes: - Keysight_34410A, use Keysight34410A instead - Keysight_34411A, use Keysight34411A instead - Keysight_34460A, use Keysight34460A instead - Keysight_34461A, use Keysight344xxA instead - Keysight_34465A, use Keysight34465A instead - Keysight_34470A, use Keysight34470A instead - N51x1, use KeysightN51x1 instead - PNABase, use KeysightPNABase instead - PNAxBase, use KeysightPNAxBase instead - KeysightSubModule, use Keysight34980ASwitchMatrixSubModule instead - KeysightSwitchMatrixSubModule, use Keysight34980ASwitchMatrixSubModule instead - B1500Module, use KeysightB1500Module instead - _Keysight_344xxA, use Keysight344xxA instead

  • Removed the deprecated Keysight submodules: - Trigger, use Keysight344xxATrigger instead - Sample, use Keysight344xxASample instead - Display, use Keysight344xxADisplay instead

  • Removed the deprecated MiniCircuits classes: - SwitchChannelBase, use MiniCircuitsSPDTSwitchChannelBase instead - SPDT_Base, use MiniCircuitsSPDTBase instead

  • Removed the deprecated USBHIDMixin class

  Removed functions:

  • Removed from qcodes.utils.deprecate: - deprecation_message - issue_deprecation_warning - deprecate decorator (use typing_extensions.deprecated instead) - _catch_deprecation_warnings - assert_not_deprecated - assert_deprecated

  • Removed make_connection_plus_from function from qcodes.dataset.sqlite.connection (#7122)

• The following modules have been deprecated in this release and will be removed in a future version:

  • qcodes.instrument.delegate.grouped_parameter

  • qcodes.instrument.function

  • qcodes.instrument.group_parameter

  • qcodes.instrument.specialized_parameters

  • qcodes.instrument.sweep_values

  • qcodes.instrument.base

  • qcodes.instrument.parameter

  • qcodes.utils.command

  • qcodes.utils.dataset

  • qcodes.utils.installation

  • qcodes.utils.helpers

  • qcodes.utils.metadata

  • qcodes.utils.plotting

  • qcodes.utils.threading

  • qcodes.utils.validators

  Please consult the API documentation at QCoDes API documentation for alternatives and migration paths. (#7262)

• The methods InstrumentBase.__getitem__, InstrumentBase.get, InstrumentBase.set, InstrumentBase.call are now deprecated with a PendingDeprecationWarning rather than a QCoDeSDeprecationWarning. This better reflects the state where there is no plan to remove them but usage is discouraged. The PendingDeprecationWarning is not printed to console by default. (#7318)

Improved:

• Fix load_from_netcdf failing for non-completed datasets due to missing completed_timestamp_raw or run_timestamp_raw attribute. (#7221)

• The QCoDeS dataset now correctly captures data for inferred parameters when added via datasaver.add_result. Previously these were discarded due to an oversight. Any parameters added in this way are available via DataSetProtocol.get_parameter_data but not exported to xarray or pandas. Future improvements to these parameters are planned and tracked here.

  The property InterDependencies_.non_dependencies has been deprecated and replaced by InterDependencies_.top_level_parameters that correctly includes inferred parameters. The InterDependencies_ object has gained two additional methods find_all_parameters_in_tree and all_parameters_in_tree_by_group.

  The not documented but publicly importable functions qcodes.dataset.exporters.export_to_pandas.load_to_concatenated_dataframe and qcodes.dataset.exporters.export_to_pandas.load_to_dataframe_dict now require an extra argument in the form of an InterDependencies_ object. Users are discouraged from using anything not documented in the QCoDeS API documentation outside QCoDeS. (#7240)

• Fix NetCDF export for datasets with None timestamp_raw values by using sentinel values (-1) during export and converting them back to None on import. This ensures NetCDF compatibility while preserving the original None values through round-trip export/import operations. (#7333)

• Exporting datasets to XArray no longer warns if two or more variables are exported with different setpoint names and/or values. No functionality of the export has changed. If the setpoints for different measured parameters have the same name, missing values will be replaced by NaN such that the measured parameters have the same coordinates in XArray. If different setpoint names are used, the exporter will automatically handle merging coordinates so each data variable is assigned its own coordinates. (#7442)

Improved Drivers:

• Corrected power range for Keysight P5004B (#7360)

• Changes to Cryomagnetics 4G Driver

  1. Added missing initialization of self._RETRY_WRITE_ASK and self._RETRY_TIME in the write_raw method to handle communication retries on VisaIOError.

  2. Updated set_field to correctly recognize Standby as a valid final state when setting the magnetic field to 0 T.

  3. Modified wait_while_ramping to check the actual magnetic field value via self._get_field() instead of relying on the status byte, since the instrument may stay in the Ramping state even after reaching the target field.

  4. Fixed unit parsing to handle unexpected trailing characters in the instrument’s response. (e.g., “r”).

  5. Fixed get_parser for Vmag, Iout, and Vout to remove units and return float.

  6. Added timeout condition to wait_while_ramping to prevent infinite loop. Will trigger Exception if timeout occurs.

  7. Fixed conversion calculations in _set_rate and _get_rate.

  8. Added function get_rates to return rates for all ranges in Tesla/min as a dictionary.

  9. Modified _set_rate to update all ranges (0-4) on the instrument (picks min value between set rate and maximum current limit for each range)

  10. Add small sleep (0.1 seconds) between write calls during max_current_limit initialization.

  11. Fixed/added unit tests to accurately reflect code changes.

  12. Modified set_field() to allow users to control the strictness of wait_while_ramping() timeout condition (1e-4 was too precise and was triggering false timeouts). (#7405)

New:

• Added qcodes.dataset.export_datasets_and_create_metadata_db() function to export all datasets from a database to NetCDF files and create a new metadata-only database. This enables users to maintain lightweight databases for metadata while relying on NetCDF files for data analysis, significantly reducing storage requirements for large experimental datasets. (#7212)

New Drivers:

• Added Keysight P5002B driver (#7360)

• Added Cryomagnetics TM-620 driver (#7398)

Under the hood:

• Refactors the InterDependencies_ class to simplify reasoning about and query of the ParamSpecBase relationships by embedding them in a NetworkX Directional Graph (DiGraph)

  Resolves #7079 (#7256)

• In dond, only process get_after_set in the loop instances where the parameter is actually being set (#7307)

• DataSetProtocol.to_xarray_dataset and DataSetProtocol.to_xarray_dataarray_dict now avoids creating a Pandas MultiIndex to infer the correct dataset shape if the shape is already known. This will resolve issues where datasets are exported with incorrect array shapes due to round off errors in the setpoints (coordinates). (#7413)