BrainVoyager 22.0 for macOS

BrainVoyager is our flagship product that provides a comprehensive, fast and elegant way to perform advanced neuroimaging data analysis and to create stunning visualizations. For more information, read the BrainVoyager release blog posts.

BrainVoyager EDU version.
If you are new to BrainVoyager and want to check it out, we recommend to use the EDU version of BrainVoyager. The EDU version does not require a license and is fully functional. It is, however, limited to specific datasets that are used to teach BrainVoyager and (f)MRI data analysis. Installing and running the EDU version is also useful to test compatibility of your computer hardware with BrainVoyager. For more details, follow the link to the EDU version.

Installation and licensing
. BrainVoyager uses a software-based licensing system and will not run without a valid single computer or floating network license. NOTE: If you use a floating network license, your license server needs to be upgraded to version 2.0 in order to work with BrainVoyager 22 (as well as the older 21 and 20 versions); if you are not contacted automatically, please contact licensing [at] brainvoyager [dot] com to request the license server upgrade. In order to install BrainVoyager for evaluation or to update a licensed version to the latest release, please download the software using the following link:
BrainVoyager_22.0_Installer_Mac64-Intel.pkg (516 MB)

If you do not yet have a license, you can use the free EDU version or ask for a time-limited trial license to evaluate BrainVoyager with your own data. A trial license unlocks most features of a full license lacking only optional components (no scripting and plugins). You need to accept the license agreement during installation.
In case you have installed an older version of BrainVoyager, close any running instance prior to installation. We recommend to deinstall the older version of BrainVoyager by simply moving the "BrainVoyager" folder located in the "/Applications" folder to the Trash; it is also advised to remove the BrainVoyager icon by dragging it out of the dock area (otherwise there might be two icons after the new install). The installer might still detect that an older version of BrainVoyager was installed before; in this case, the installer may show an "Upgrade" button instead of an "Install" button, but in both cases the same files will be installed.

Double-click the downloaded installation package file (“BrainVoyager_22.0_Installer_Mac64-Intel.pkg”) to start the BrainVoyager installer. The package and the BrainVoyager executable have been signed and should start directly. In case that "Gatekeeper" prevents opening the package (.pkg) file, Option-click (or right-click with a two-button mouse) the package icon and click "Open" in the context menu followed by a click on "Open" in the appearing Gatekeeper dialog. If you do not see the BrainVoyager Installer, click the Installer icon in the Dock to show the Installer in front of other windows. Then simply follow the instructions of the package installer (see image sequence on the right).

If you have already a valid software license, you can continue using BrainVoyager as before after installation and enjoy its new features. If you do not have a license, you will see a licensing screen after starting the software. To activate (unlock) a time-limited trial version, you need to send an email to “licensing [at] brainvoyager [dot] com” containing the displayed “Hardware-ID” and additional information for registration (name, institute/lab, mail address). Such an email is prepared automatically by clicking the “Prepare Email” button in the displayed "License Activation" dialog. Usually within a few days you will receive a license key and a license name/ID (e.g. TSKF307BC88-PETER-SUGAR). After entering the license name and key in the licensing dialog, click the "Activate" button to activate the (trial) license and BrainVoyager is ready to be used for 30 days. More details about the licensing and activation process can be found on the page BrainVoyager Software Licensing.
In order to get the full version of BrainVoyager (after evaluating the trial version), please send an email to “sales [at] brainvoyager [dot] com” to purchase a license. The full version unlocks the program permanently (or for a certain duration) and enables some features that are disabled in the trial version, including scripting and plugins. If you purchase the full version of BrainVoyager, you will get a key that unlocks all licensed features and the software can be used as long as requested in the purchased license. There is also a floating network license available allowing to use a licensed maximum number of computers concurrently from computers in a local (e.g. lab) network. For details send an email to licensing [at] brainvoyager [dot] com.
The BrainVoyager.app bundle will be installed in the "/Applications" folder. Notebooks, scripts and plugins will be installed in the user's “Documents/BrainVoyager/Extensions" folder.

System requirements
BrainVoyager 22.0 is compatible with macOS 10.15 (Catalina, recommended), macOS 10.14 (Mojave), and macOS 10.13 (High Sierra). It also works on macOS 11.0 (Big Sur) but you may experience some glitches in the user interface that will be fixed in an upcoming minor release. BrainVoyager 22.0 also works on Apple Silicon (M1) but since it is compiled for Intel processors, it will run under Rosetta2 in emulation mode. A native version for Apple Silicon is planned for one of the next minor releases.
While many operations of BrainVoyager run with modest working memory demands, a minimum of 4 GB is required and 8+ GB recommended.
OpenGL / OpenCL. BrainVoyager is a graphics-intensive program requiring OpenGL 3.3 or higher for its operation as well as (optionally but highly recommended) OpenCL for acceleration of compute-intensive calculations. Make sure that the latest graphics drivers are installed, which should be the case if the operating system is regularly updated. In case you have multiple graphics cards, make sure that the better performing one is used for BrainVoyager. Some Apple laptops have a lower-performing integrated Intel graphics card, and a high-performance (discrete, stand-alone) graphics card from AMD or NVIDIA. While BrainVoyager runs fine with recent integrated Intel graphics cards, it is advised to use the high-performance graphics card to run BrainVoyager in such constellations, which should be done automatically by macOS. To check this, BrainVoyager reports which graphics card is chosen as well as which version of OpenGL is available in the program's "Log pane". In case the GUI is not starting for some reason, you can also consult the "bv_ogl.txt" file that BrainVoyager stores in the "Documents" folder of the current user.
Note. BrainVoyager supports OpenCL (GP-GPU) acceleration for several compute-intensive operations if supported by your computer system. To benefit from this, OpenCL acceleration must be turned on in the "Settings" dialog. For details how to test its performance and how to enable it, inspect topic "Exploiting the Power of GP-GPUs" in chapter "Additional Documentation" of the User's Guide.
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Python Support
Since version 20, BrainVoyager supports an embedded Python interpreter as a new programming environment for scripting and plugin development. Version 22.0 adds BV Notebooks that also use Python for reproducible data analysis. Furthermore, version 22.0 adds deep neural networks for advanced cortex segmentation that also requires Python. While macOS comes with Python, it uses an older Python version and it is thus necessary to install the supported 3.6 version of Python in order to use Python with BrainVoyager 22. We recommend to install the Miniconda distribution but also the standard distribution of Python from the Python.org web site (or any other distribution) can be used. Miniconda has the advantage that you can define multiple environments with different installed modules. If you define one Python 3.6 Miniconda3 environment with the name "env_bv", it will be automatically picked up by BrainVoyager as the default Python version. For more details, follow the instructions to enable Python.

After installing Python 3.6 as described, BrainVoyager will enable Python automatically when used the first time, e.g. when evaluating code in a notebook or in a Python code editor. In case this does not work since another 3.6 distribution (or environment name) is used, one can use the "Select Python on Disk" item in the "Python" menu to point BrainVoyager to the desired version.

The BV Notebook window can be launched from the respective icon in the toolbar or from the "Notebooks" menu. Several example notebooks are available in the "Documents/BrainVoyager/Notebooks" folder; this folder is also the default location when using the "Open" command in the "BV Notebook" window. When clicking the Python icon on the right side of the main toolbar, BrainVoyager presents a (docked or floating) interactive python console and a python development window that can be used to load, edit and save Python files. To learn how to use Python in notebooks and code editors to script processing routines or to add new functionality, consult the Python Developer Guide that is available from the "Python" menu. You will also find several example Python files in the "PythonScripts" and "PythonPlugins" sub-folders of the “Documents/BrainVoyager/Extensions" folder; these folders are displayed also as default in the "Files" panel on the left side of the Python development window.
Documentation
The User's Guide (available locally as well as online) provides basic and advanced information about BrainVoyager and can be easily invoked by clicking the "User's Guide" icon in the main toolbar or by clicking the "User's Guide" item (or "User’s Guide (Web)" item) in the "Help" menu. The BrainVoyager 22.0 User's Guide is also available as an e-book.
Several PDF files introducing various topics are also placed in the "Documents/BrainVoyager/GettingStartedGuides" folder after installation, including the BrainVoyager Getting Started Guide that is highly recommended for beginners. If you are upgrading BrainVoyager, you may want to check out the "News" section of the User's Guide. We highly recommend to read the release notes (see "Help" menu) to learn about new features, enhancements and bug fixes. Release notes are available for the current as well as previous releases. Documentation is also available on this web page, including the E-book version of the user's guide. If you have any questions, suggestions or bug reports, please send an email to support [at] BrainVoyager [dot] com.

We also recommend to install the Documentation Viewer 1.0 application that can be used to view the User's Guide (which is installed in the "/Applications/BrainVoyager/UsersGuide" folder) without running BrainVoyager; the tool can be used also to view other help files including the Developer Guide or help files from other software including Turbo-BrainVoyager and Brain Tutor. The program registers the ".qhc" compressed HTML format after the first launch enabling to view any ".qhc" help file by using "File Open" or by simply double-clicking it in the Finder.
DocumentationViewer_v10_Mac64.dmg (22.4 MB)
Sample data
If you want to learn basic and advanced features of BrainVoyager (EDU), it may be useful to start with example data sets, which are also used in our BrainVoyager training courses. The installers available for download on this page do not contain sample data. To download example data sets, click the "Sample Data Web Page" item in the "Help" menu of BrainVoyager or visit the example data sets page with your Browser. The analysis of the "Faces, Houses in Visual Fields" dataset is described in detail in the BrainVoyager Getting Started Guide.