The flash application presented here is intended both as a practical tool and a pedagogical aid (cf Welland 2005, Simak 2006). Focal mechanism diagrams may be rapidly generated and nodal plane data exported to other programs and web sites for statistical study or map rendering. Students may benefit from experimenting with alternative fits of focal mechanism solutions to raw data.. This will generate discussion about what constitutes a "best fit" and what variables (strike, rake, etc.) are most sensitive to error for a particular data set (e.g. Snoke 2003).
Click here to try FirstMo.swf online. Or click here to download a zip archive containing FirstMo.swf, a sample jpeg, and a sample data.xml file. The online version has been fully tested using the Firefox web browser on WinXP and MacOSX, with the latest flash v. 8.0 plugin (v.7 or earlier will not work properly). Other web browsers and operating systems may have issues.