Waveform Totally Explained

Everything about Waveform totally explained

Waveform means the shape and form of a signal such as a wave moving in a solid, liquid or gaseous medium.
In many cases the medium in which the wave is being propagated doesn't permit a direct visual image of the form. In these cases, the term 'waveform' refers to the shape of a graph of the varying quantity against time or distance. An instrument called an oscilloscope can be used to pictorially represent the wave as a repeating image on a CRT or LCD screen.
By extension of the above, the term 'waveform' is now also sometimes used to describe the shape of the graph of any varying quantity against time.

Examples of waveforms

Common periodic waveforms include

Sine wave: sin (2 π t). The amplitude of the waveform follows a trigonometric sine function with respect to time.
Sawtooth wave: 2 (t − floor(t)) − 1. This looks like the teeth of a saw. Found often in time bases for display scanning. It is used as the starting point for subtractive synthesis, as a sawtooth wave of constant period contains odd and even harmonics that fall off at −6 dB/octave.
Square wave: saw(x) − saw (x − duty). This waveform is commonly used to represent digital information. It is square wave of constant period contains odd harmonics that fall off at −6 dB/octave.
Triangle wave: (t − 2 floor ((t + 1) /2)) (−1)^{floor ((t + 1) /2)}. This is the integral of the square wave. It contains odd harmonics that fall off at −12 dB/octave.

Other waveforms are often called composite waveforms and can often be described as a combination of a number of sinusoidal waves or other basis functions added together.
The Fourier series describes the decomposition of periodic waveforms, such that any periodic waveform can be formed by the sum of a fundamental component and harmonic components. Finite-energy non-periodic waveforms can be analyzed into sinusoids by the Fourier transform.

Further Information

Get more info on 'Waveform'.

External Link Exchanges

Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:

<a href="http://waveform.totallyexplained.com">Waveform Totally Explained</a>

Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned.