About four-index Miller indices

[Petrichor728]

Hello Professor Seto,

I hope this email finds you well! I’d like to begin by thanking you again for taking my suggestion and updating ReciPro—it has been of great help to me. With the help of ReciPro, I have completed a manuscript, in which I also cited your paper. The software has now been adopted by our research group, and everyone appreciates your effort and dedication.

I have a question during our usage, and I hope to receive your help and feedback. Currently, ReciPro only supports three-index Miller indices [UVW] and (hkl). Is there a way to display the four-index Miller indices [uvtw] and (hkil)? For some HCP metals, we usually use the four-index Miller indices for indexing. If this feature already exists and I simply haven’t found it, could you please point me to where it is? If it is not yet available, would it be possible for you to add this feature? That would save us a lot of time spent converting three-index Miller indices to four-index Miller indices. Thank you very much for your feedback!

Thank you again for creating such a great piece of software!

[seto77]

Thank you for your request. Currently, the Stereonet function only supports Miller-Bravais index notation (i.e. (hkil)).

Of course, it is possible to add support for Miller-Bravais index notation to other functions—where would you like it added?

On the other hand, to be honest, I’m not very keen on adding support for Weber index notation (i.e. [uviw]). As you will see if you read the paper at the URL below, it is a concept that is quite confusing and tends to confuse beginners.
https://hal.univ-lorraine.fr/hal-01859761v1/document

[Petrichor728]

Hello Professor Seto,

Thank you for your reply—I truly appreciate it and have benefited a lot from it. I haven’t looked deeply into the development and debate around four-index and three-index Miller indices. Currently, our work mainly involves transmission electron microscopy, indexing SAED patterns, measuring d-spacings, and so on. Since four-index Miller indices are commonly used in papers on HCP materials, I reached out to ask whether this feature might be available. I hadn’t explored the topic in depth at the time and was simply hoping that the software could directly display four-index Miller indices, so we wouldn’t have to manually convert from the three-index notation using formulas.

If the four-index Miller indices [uvtw] and (hkil) are to be added, modules such as Scattering Factor, Stereonet, Diffraction Simulator, Spot ID v1, and Spot ID v2 might all require updates. Alternatively, perhaps a button could be added on the main interface: when analyzing hexagonal structures, the user could check the box, and ReciPro would display four-index Miller indices throughout; when analyzing other structures, the box could be unchecked, and ReciPro would revert to three-index Miller indices. I am not familiar with programming or coding, so I’m unsure how much work this would entail. If my request is unreasonable, please forgive me.

Thank you once again for your dedication and for creating such a great piece of software as ReciPro—it has already made our research much smoother. I look forward to your reply.

Thank you for your request. Currently, the Stereonet function only supports Miller-Bravais index notation (i.e. (hkil)). Of course, it is possible to add support for Miller-Bravais index notation to other functions—where would you like it added?

On the other hand, to be honest, I’m not very keen on adding support for Weber index notation (i.e. [uviw]). As you will see if you read the paper at the URL below, it is a concept that is quite confusing and tends to confuse beginners. https://hal.univ-lorraine.fr/hal-01859761v1/document