# Select subset of points identified as cell centers, and measure distance between them

**URL:** https://discourse.paraview.org/t/select-subset-of-points-identified-as-cell-centers-and-measure-distance-between-them/3577
**Category:** ParaView Support
**Tags:** vtk
**Created:** [February 16, 2020, 8:45pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/select-subset-of-points-identified-as-cell-centers-and-measure-distance-between-them/3577 "2020-02-16T20:45:48Z")
**Posts on this page:** 5
**Page:** 1

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### Author: ![Vikram](https://discourse.paraview.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/v/e47774/32.png) [@Vikram](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/Vikram)
#### Post date: [February 16, 2020, 8:45pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/select-subset-of-points-identified-as-cell-centers-and-measure-distance-between-them/3577/1 "2020-02-16T20:45:48Z")

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Hello,  
I would like to select a subset of points from a preexisting VTK data structure, and then use a ruler to compute distances between point pairs.

For example, from a given data set, I can first identify all cells between a temperature range 300 - 600 K using Threshold. Then I can use the CellCenters filter to plot all the centers of these points. These cell centers then appear on screen using the ‘Point Gaussian’ representation.

I would like to go further and select a subset of these visible cell centers, and compute distances between them.

Looking online, I saw older emails about a Selection Editor which was used to select cell centers, however, I understand that the Selection Editor was later removed. I havent been able to find anything else that can help me select points of my choosing.

Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks.

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### Author: ![mwestphal](https://discourse.paraview.org/user_avatar/discourse.paraview.org/mwestphal/32/17_2.png) [@mwestphal](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/mwestphal)
#### Post date: [February 17, 2020, 3:33am UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/select-subset-of-points-identified-as-cell-centers-and-measure-distance-between-them/3577/2 "2020-02-17T03:33:19Z")

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Are you talking about the “Selection Inspector”. Indeed it does not exist in the form it was documented.

In any case what you can do :

- Compute the distance manually using the Ruler source
- Write your own python programmable filter to compute all distance as once.

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### Author: ![Vikram](https://discourse.paraview.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/v/e47774/32.png) [@Vikram](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/Vikram)
#### Post date: [February 17, 2020, 4:47am UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/select-subset-of-points-identified-as-cell-centers-and-measure-distance-between-them/3577/3 "2020-02-17T04:47:58Z")

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The problem I am having is that there seems to be no way of selecting any point from the cloud of points that are rendered by the CellCenters filter. Once I can select the points I want distances between, the Ruler can indeed be used to find the distances.

Thanks.

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### Author: ![mwestphal](https://discourse.paraview.org/user_avatar/discourse.paraview.org/mwestphal/32/17_2.png) [@mwestphal](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/mwestphal)
#### Post date: [February 17, 2020, 4:54am UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/select-subset-of-points-identified-as-cell-centers-and-measure-distance-between-them/3577/4 "2020-02-17T04:54:22Z")

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Use Ctrl-P with the ruler to pick the points.

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### Author: ![Vikram](https://discourse.paraview.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/v/e47774/32.png) [@Vikram](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/Vikram)
#### Post date: [February 17, 2020, 4:31pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/select-subset-of-points-identified-as-cell-centers-and-measure-distance-between-them/3577/5 "2020-02-17T16:31:05Z")

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Thanks the Ctrl-P worked to pick the rendered points.