Now I've never given this any thought before but a colleague asked me this today. So when we calculate single cycle of a sine wave on a graph, it always is missing the last data point. This seemed okay to me because the first data point of the next cycle will start where the last data point would be, effectively completing the sine wave from the last cycle when it begins the sine wave for the next cycle. But first of all, is this true? If I then introduce a new waveform that starts at a different value than what should have been the last data point of the last cycle, it jumps from the last data point of the sine wave (remember it is missing the last data point to complete the sine wave) to the start of the new waveform. Is this right? Instinct tells me that the graph can't display the last data point properly, but the timing is still correct because the second waveform is still starting on time. To artificially add a data point to complete the sine wave and then start the next waveform seems like we are going to start the next waveform one sample too late. I've always assumed this was right, but is it really? He made me doubt what I have always assumed to be true.

LabVIEW

sine wave question (not really a LabVIEW question)

Author

Thanks, everyone. You make me feel like maybe my question was actually a legit one.

Bill

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