HEC-DSSVue — The Complete Guide: Free Time-Series Management for HEC Models
HEC-DSSVue is a tool from the Hydrologic Engineering Center (HEC) of the US Army Corps of Engineers for working with HEC-DSS files — the database in which the HEC programs store time series and paired data. It is in the public domain and completely free, and it suits any project in any country that uses the HEC programs.
HEC-DSSVue
US Army Corps of Engineers (HEC)
View, edit, plot and process time series in HEC-DSS files — the companion tool for HEC-RAS, HEC-HMS and HEC-ResSim models.
Get it from the vendorWhat you get
- Browsing — a list of every record in the file, filtered by location, parameter and period.
- Plots and tables — comparing several series on the same time axis.
- Editing — fixing missing or wrong values in measured data.
- Math processing — accumulation, moving averages, changing the time step, operations between series.
- Import and export — moving data to and from spreadsheets, plus scripting for repetitive work.
How engineers use it
You prepare rainfall and stage data from gauges before feeding them to a catchment model or a channel analysis, then open the results file to compare the computed hydrograph with the observed one. On long projects it becomes the data hub of the model — one place where input and output are stored and checked.
Related tools
For catchment hydrology — HEC-HMS. For channel hydraulics and flooding — HEC-RAS. For reservoir operation — HEC-ResSim.
HEC-HMS
US Army Corps of Engineers
Rainfall-runoff hydrological model — infiltration, unit hydrograph and routing. Pairs with HEC-RAS.
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HEC-RAS
US Army Corps of Engineers
1D/2D hydraulic model for rivers, bridges and culverts, with floodplain mapping. The world standard.
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HEC-ResSim
US Army Corps of Engineers, Hydrologic Engineering Center
Simulates reservoir operations — flood control, low-flow augmentation and water supply, for one reservoir or a system of reservoirs.
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HEC-SSP
US Army Corps of Engineers (HEC)
Statistical analysis of hydrologic data: flood-flow frequency, volume-duration and coincident frequency, for deriving design floods from gauge records.
Get it from the vendorThe bottom line
Anyone working with the HEC programs needs HEC-DSSVue. It is public domain and completely free, including for commercial use.