Plotting packages overview Robert Putnam putnambu edu IST

Plotting packages overview Robert Putnam putnam@bu. edu IS&T Scientific Visualization Tutorial – Spring 2010

Outline l Choosing a plotting package l gnuplot, Xmgrace, Matlab, Excel l Demos IS&T Scientific Visualization Tutorial – Spring 2010

Choosing a package l Features – Graph types – Labeling, annotation. – FFT, curve fitting, etc. l Quality of output – Control over lines, symbols, fonts, etc. – Overall appearance l Type of output – File types: tiff, jpeg, La. Tex, postscript, etc. IS&T Scientific Visualization Tutorial – Spring 2010

Choosing a package l Work flow (integrated into numerical or spreadsheet application, batch options, standalone, piped into, etc. ) l UI, ease of use – Command line v. GUI l Portability l Cost IS&T Scientific Visualization Tutorial – Spring 2010

Plotting packages l Open source – gnuplot – Xmgrace l Commercial – Matlab – Microsoft Excel IS&T Scientific Visualization Tutorial – Spring 2010

gnuplot and xmgrace l Free, open-source l Run under Linux/Unix, et al. l Many on-line examples l Many graph types supported IS&T Scientific Visualization Tutorial – Spring 2010

gnuplot l Long history (in development since 1986) l Also runs under MS Windows and OSX. l 3 d plots as well as 2 d plots l Excellent documentation and examples. See also Gnuplot in Action, Janert. IS&T Scientific Visualization Tutorial – Spring 2010

gnuplot l Command line user interface l Full-featured scripting language l Many output options: – eps, fig, jpeg, La. Te. X, metafont, pbm, pdf, png, postscript, svg l Can pipe directly from program l Batch mode IS&T Scientific Visualization Tutorial – Spring 2010

Xmgrace l Long history (since 1991) – XMGR -> ACE/gr-> Grace – "GRaphing, Advanced Computation and Exploration of data“, or – "Grace Revamps ACE/gr“ (recursive, like GNU) – Since 1996, development team working under Evgeny Stambulchik at Weizmann Institute of Science. IS&T Scientific Visualization Tutorial – Spring 2010

Xmgrace l GUI l Much control over layout, fonts, line appearance, etc. l Curve fitting, linear and non-linear l Analysis – FFT, integration/differentiation, correlation, smoothing, etc. IS&T Scientific Visualization Tutorial – Spring 2010

Xmgrace l GUI – The good news: • Highly interactive – Zoom – Change graph features on the fly – The bad news: • Non-intuitive • Unfriendly scripting language IS&T Scientific Visualization Tutorial – Spring 2010

Matlab l Commercial package (MATHWORKS) since 1980 s. l Linux, Windows, Mac l Numerical computing environment – Mathematical functions for linear algebra, statistics, Fourier analysis, filtering, optimization, and numerical integration IS&T Scientific Visualization Tutorial – Spring 2010

Matlab l Workflow options – Interactive • Command line and/or menu interface – Batch mode – Integrate with external applications/languages (e. g. , C/C++, Java, Excel) IS&T Scientific Visualization Tutorial – Spring 2010

Matlab plotting l 2 d plot types: – Line, area, bar, and pie charts – Direction and velocity plots – Histograms – Polygons and surfaces – Scatter/bubble plots – Animations IS&T Scientific Visualization Tutorial – Spring 2010

Matlab plotting, cont. l 3 d plotting and volume visualization – Surface, contour, and mesh – Image plots – Cone, slice, stream, and isosurface IS&T Scientific Visualization Tutorial – Spring 2010

Microsoft Excel l Commercial spreadsheet package for MS Windows, Macintosh – In wide use – Easy integration with other MS applications – Some support for automation with VBA (Visual Basic Application) IS&T Scientific Visualization Tutorial – Spring 2010

Excel plotting l Chart types – Column, bar, line, pie, scatter, area, doughnut, radar, surface, bubble, stock, cylinder/cone/pyramid 3 -D, soft shadowing, and anti-aliasing l GUI l – E. g. , direct modification of graph appearance – Cut and paste to other MS applications IS&T Scientific Visualization Tutorial – Spring 2010

Demos l Plot sin(x)/x l Plot data: IS&T Scientific Visualization Tutorial – Spring 2010