# Creating misc-settings.json for mcc\_get\_settings

**URL:** <https://community.brain-map.org/t/creating-misc-settings-json-for-mcc-get-settings/1113>\
**Category:** Technical\
**Tags:** nwb, analysis, how-to, electrophysiology\
**Created:** [June 2, 2021, 3:10pm UTC](https://community.brain-map.org/t/creating-misc-settings-json-for-mcc-get-settings/1113 "2021-06-02T15:10:28Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![damian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/34f0e0/32.png) [@damian](https://community.brain-map.org/u/damian)\
**Post date:** [June 2, 2021, 3:10pm UTC](https://community.brain-map.org/t/creating-misc-settings-json-for-mcc-get-settings/1113/1 "2021-06-02T15:10:28Z")

</div>

I’m trying to convert my abf files to nwb but unsure how to create the required misc-settings.json file. The example shows

```auto
    "IN0": "Demo1_1",
    "IN1": "Demo1_2",
    "ScaleFactors": {
        "C1NSD1SHORT": 1.05,
        "C1NSD2SHORT": 1.05,
        "CHIRP": 1,
        "LSFINEST": 1.05,
        "SSFINEST": 7,
        "TRIPPLE": 7
    }
}

```

Are `IN0` and `IN1` the amplifer names? If so how do I know the name of the amplifiers. I’ve tried to add the 700B serial number but get an error `Ignoring exception Amplifier named 00834031 does not exist..`

Thanks!

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![t-b](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex027/user_avatar/community.brain-map.org/t-b/32/429_2.png) [@t-b](https://community.brain-map.org/u/t-b)\
**Post date:** [June 4, 2021, 4:32pm UTC](https://community.brain-map.org/t/creating-misc-settings-json-for-mcc-get-settings/1113/2 "2021-06-04T16:32:31Z")

</div>

Hi Damian,

the JSON settings file is generated by [ipfx/mcc\_get\_settings.py at master · AllenInstitute/ipfx · GitHub](https://github.com/AllenInstitute/ipfx/blob/master/ipfx/bin/mcc_get_settings.py). This script is used to fetch amplifier settings which are not included in the ABF file and must be run on each data acquisition run.

In case you have already acquired data, the other use case for the settings file and the protocol folder is to supply your stimulus ATF files and accompanying scaling factors.

tl;dr:  
For converting arbitrary ABF files you can just ignore the JSON settings file.

A refactored package, reusing the code from ipfx but with some more features, is available from [GitHub - byte-physics/x-to-nwb: Convert various patch-clamp data formats to NWBv2](https://github.com/byte-physics/x-to-nwb). This also accepts a `--no-searchSettingsFile` flag.

Does that answer your question?