The GNU Plotting Utilities

Programs and functions for vector graphics and data plotting

Version 2.6

Robert S. Maier
Copyright c 1989, 1990, 1991, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2005, 2008, 2009 Free
Software Foundation, Inc.
Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this manual under the terms of
the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or any later version published by the
Free Software Foundation; with no Invariant Sections, no Front-Cover Texts and no Back-
Cover Texts. A copy of the license is included in the appendix entitled “The GNU Free
Documentation License”.
Chapter 1: The GNU Plotting Utilities 1

1 The GNU Plotting Utilities

The GNU plotting utilities consist of eight command-line programs: the graphics programs
graph, plot, pic2plot, tek2plot, and plotfont, and the mathematical programs spline,
ode, and double. Distributed with these programs is GNU libplot, the library on which
the graphics programs are based. GNU libplot is a function library for device-independent
two-dimensional vector graphics, including vector graphics animations under the X Window
System. It has bindings for both C and C++.
The graphics programs and GNU libplot can export vector graphics in the following
formats.
X If this output option is selected, there is no output file. Output is directed to
a popped-up window on an X Window System display.
PNG This is “portable network graphics” format, which is increasingly popular on the
Web. Unlike GIF format, it is unencumbered by patents. Files in PNG format
may be viewed or edited with many applications, such as display, which is
part of the free ImageMagick package.
PNM This is “portable anymap” format. There are three types of portable anymap:
PBM (portable bitmap, for monochrome images), PGM (portable graymap),
and PPM (portable pixmap, for colored images). The output file will use which-
ever is most appropriate. Portable anymaps may be translated to other formats
with the netpbm package, or viewed with display.
GIF This is pseudo-GIF format rather than true GIF format. Unlike GIF format
it does not use LZW compression, so it does not transgress the Unisys LZW
patent. However, files in pseudo-GIF format may be viewed or edited with any
application that accepts GIF format, such as display.
SVG This is Scalable Vector Graphics format. SVG is an XML-based format for
vector graphics on the Web. The W3 Consortium has more information on
SVG, which is being developed by its Graphics Activity.
AI This is the format used by Adobe Illustrator. Files in this format may be
edited with Adobe Illustrator (version 5, and more recent versions), or other
applications.
PS This is idraw-editable Postscript format. Files in this format may be sent to
a Postscript printer, imported into another document, or edited with the free
idraw drawing editor. See Section E.1 [idraw], page 171.
CGM This is Computer Graphics Metafile format, which may be imported into an
application or displayed in any Web browser with a CGM plug-in. By default,
a binary file in version 3 CGM format that conforms to the WebCGM profile
is produced. The CGM Open Consortium has more information on WebCGM,
which is a standard for Web-based vector graphics.
Fig This is a vector graphics format that may be displayed or edited with the free
xfig drawing editor. See Section E.2 [xfig], page 171.
Chapter 1: The GNU Plotting Utilities 2

PCL 5 This is a powerful version of Hewlett–Packard’s Printer Control Language. Files

in this format may be sent to a LaserJet printer or compatible device (note that
most inkjets do not support PCL 5).
HP-GL This is Hewlett–Packard’s Graphics Language. By default, the modern variant
HP-GL/2 is produced. Files in HP-GL or HP-GL/2 format may be imported
into a document or sent to a plotter.
ReGIS This is the graphics format understood by several DEC terminals (VT340,
VT330, VT241, VT240) and emulators, including the DECwindows terminal
emulator, dxterm.
Tek This is the graphics format understood by Tektronix 4014 terminals and emu-
lators, including the emulators built into the xterm terminal emulator program
and the MS-DOS version of kermit.
Metafile This is device-independent GNU graphics metafile format. The plot program
can translate it to any of the preceding formats.
Of the command-line graphics programs, the best known is graph, which is an appli-
cation for plotting two-dimensional scientific data. It reads one or more data files con-
taining datasets, and outputs a plot. The above output formats are supported. The cor-
responding commands are graph -T X, graph -T png, graph -T pnm, graph -T gif, graph
-T svg, graph -T ai, graph -T ps, graph -T cgm, graph -T fig, graph -T pcl, graph -T
hpgl, graph -T regis, graph -T tek, and graph. graph without a ‘-T’ option (referred to
as ‘raw graph’) produces output in GNU metafile format.
graph can read datasets in both ASCII and binary format, and datasets in the ‘table’
format produced by the plotting program gnuplot. It produces a plot with or without axes
and labels. You may specify labels and ranges for the axes, and the size and position of the
plot on the display. The labels may contain subscripts and subscripts, Greek letters, and
other special symbols; there is also support for Cyrillic script (i.e., Russian) and Japanese.
You may specify the type of marker symbol used for each dataset, and such parameters as
the style and thickness of the line (if any) used to connect points in a dataset. The plotting
of filled regions is supported, as is the drawing of error bars. graph provides full support for
multiplotting. With a single invocation of graph, you may produce a multiplot consisting
of many plots, either side by side or inset. Each plot will have its own axes and data.
graph -T X, graph -T tek, graph -T regis, and raw graph have a feature that most
plotting programs do not have. They can accept input from a pipe, and plot data points
to the output in real time. For this to occur, the user must specify ranges for both axes, so
that graph does not need to wait until the end of the input before determining them.
The plot program is a so-called plot filter. It can translate GNU graphics metafiles
(produced for example by raw graph) into any supported output format. The corresponding
commands are plot -T X, plot -T png, plot -T pnm, plot -T gif, plot -T svg, plot -T
ai, plot -T ps, plot -T cgm, plot -T fig, plot -T pcl, plot -T hpgl, plot -T regis,
plot -T tek, and plot. The plot program is useful if you wish to produce output in
several different formats while invoking graph only once. It is also useful if you wish to
translate files in the traditional ‘plot(5)’ format produced by, e.g., the non-GNU versions
of graph provided with some operating systems. GNU metafile format is compatible with
plot(5) format.
Chapter 1: The GNU Plotting Utilities 3

The pic2plot program can translate from the pic language to any supported output
format. The pic language, which was invented at Bell Laboratories, is used for creating box-
and-arrow diagrams of the kind frequently found in technical papers and textbooks. The cor-
responding commands are pic2plot -T X, pic2plot -T png, pic2plot -T pnm, pic2plot
-T gif, pic2plot -T ai, pic2plot -T ps, pic2plot -T cgm, pic2plot -T fig, pic2plot
-T pcl, pic2plot -T hpgl, pic2plot -T regis, pic2plot -T tek, and pic2plot.
The tek2plot program can translate from Tektronix format to any supported output
format. The corresponding commands are tek2plot -T X, tek2plot -T png, tek2plot
-T pnm, tek2plot -T gif, tek2plot -T svg, tek2plot -T ai, tek2plot -T ps, tek2plot
-T cgm, tek2plot -T fig, tek2plot -T pcl, tek2plot -T hpgl, tek2plot -T regis, and
tek2plot. tek2plot is useful if you have an older application that produces drawings in
Tektronix format.
The plotfont program is a simple utility that displays a character map for any font
that is available to graph, plot, pic2plot, or tek2plot. The 35 standard Postscript fonts
are available if the ‘-T X’, ‘-T ai’, ‘-T ps’, ‘-T cgm’, or ‘-T fig’ options are used. The
45 standard PCL 5 fonts (i.e., “LaserJet” fonts) are available if the ‘-T ai’, ‘-T pcl’ or
‘-T hpgl’ options are used. In the latter two cases (‘-T pcl’ and ‘-T hpgl’), a number
of Hewlett–Packard vector fonts are available as well. A set of 22 Hershey vector fonts,
including Cyrillic fonts and a Japanese font, is always available. When producing output
for an X Window System display, any of the graphics programs can use scalable X fonts.
Of the command-line mathematical programs, spline does spline interpolation of scalar
or vector-valued data. It normally uses either cubic spline interpolation or exponential
splines in tension, but like graph it can function as a real-time filter under some circum-
stances. Besides splining datasets, it can construct curves, either open or closed, through
arbitrarily chosen points in d-dimensional space. ode provides the ability to integrate an
ordinary differential equation or a system of ordinary differential equations, when pro-
vided with an explicit expression for each equation. It supplements the plotting program
gnuplot, which can plot functions but not integrate ordinary differential equations. The
final command-line mathematical program, double, is a filter for converting, scaling and
cutting binary or ASCII data streams. It is still under development and is not yet docu-
mented.
The GNU libplot function library, on which the command-line graphics programs are
based, is discussed at length elsewhere in this documentation. It gives C and C++ programs
the ability to draw such objects as lines, open and closed polylines, arcs (both circular and
elliptic), quadratic and cubic Bezier curves, circles and ellipses, points (i.e., pixels), marker
symbols, and text strings. The filling of objects other than points, marker symbols, and
text strings is supported (fill color, as well as pen color, can be set arbitrarily). Text strings
can be drawn in any of a large number of fonts. The 35 standard Postscript fonts are
supported by the X Window System, SVG, Illustrator, Postscript, CGM, and xfig drivers,
and the 45 standard PCL 5 fonts are supported by the SVG, Illustrator, PCL 5 and HP-
GL/2 drivers. The latter two also support a number of Hewlett–Packard vector fonts. All
drivers, including the PNG, PNM, GIF, ReGIS, Tektronix and metafile drivers, support a
set of 22 Hershey vector fonts.
The support for drawing text strings is extensive. Text strings may include subscripts
and superscripts, and may include characters chosen from more than one font in a typeface.
Many non-alphanumeric characters may be included. The entire collection of over 1700
Chapter 1: The GNU Plotting Utilities 4

‘Hershey glyphs’ digitized by Allen V. Hershey at the U.S. Naval Surface Weapons Center,
which includes many curious symbols, is built into GNU libplot. Text strings in the so-
called EUC-JP encoding (the Extended Unix Code for Japanese) can be also be drawn.
Such strings may include both syllabic Japanese characters (Hiragana and Katakana) and
ideographic Japanese characters (Kanji). GNU libplot contains a library of 603 Kanji,
including 596 of the 2965 frequently used Level 1 Kanji.
Chapter 2: The graph Application 5

2 The graph Application

Each invocation of graph reads one or more datasets from files named on the command line
or from standard input, and prepares a plot. There are many command-line options for
adjusting the visual appearance of the plot. See Section 2.6 [graph Invocation], page 14, for
documentation on all options. The following sections explain how to use the most frequently
used options, by giving examples.

2.1 Simple examples using graph

By default, graph reads ASCII data from the files specified on the command line, or from
standard input if no files are specified. The data are pairs of numbers, interpreted as the x
and y coordinates of data points. An example would be:
0.0 0.0
1.0 0.2
2.0 0.0
3.0 0.4
4.0 0.2
5.0 0.6
Data points do not need to be on different lines, nor do the x and y coordinates of a data
point need to be on the same line. However, there should be no blank lines in the input if
it is to be viewed as forming a single dataset.
To plot such a dataset with graph, you could do
graph -T ps datafile > plot.ps
or equivalently
graph -T ps < datafile > plot.ps
Either of these would produce an encapsulated Postscript file ‘plot.ps’, which could be
sent to a printer, displayed on a screen by the Postscript viewer gv, or edited with the free
drawing editor idraw. The ‘--page-size’ option, or equivalently the PAGESIZE environment
variable, specifies the size of the page on which the plot will be positioned. The default is
"letter", i.e., 8.5 in by 11 in, but "a4" or other ISO or ANSI page sizes could equally well
be specified. See Appendix C [Page and Viewport Sizes], page 167.
Similarly, you would do
graph -T svg < datafile > plot.svg
graph -T cgm < datafile > plot.cgm
to produce SVG and WebCGM files that could be displayed in a Web browser with SVG
and WebCGM support, or
graph -T fig < datafile > plot.fig
to produce a file ‘plot.fig’ in Fig format that could be edited with the free xfig drawing
editor, or
graph -T ai < datafile > plot.ai
to produce a file ‘plot.ai’ that could be edited with Adobe Illustrator. If you do
Chapter 2: The graph Application 6

graph -T hpgl < datafile > plot.plt

you will produce a file ‘plot.plt’ in the Hewlett–Packard Graphics Language (HP-GL/2)
that may be sent to a Hewlett–Packard plotter. Similarly, you would use graph -T pcl to
produce a file in PCL 5 format that may be printed on a LaserJet or other laser printer.
You would use graph -T X to pop up a window on an X Window System display, and
display the plot in it. For that, you would do
graph -T X < datafile
If you use graph -T X, no output file will be produced: only a window. The window will
vanish if you type ‘q’ or click your mouse in it.
You may also use graph -T png to produce a PNG file, graph -T pnm to produce a PNM
file (a “portable anymap”), and graph -T gif to produce a pseudo-GIF file. If the free
image display application display is available on your system, you could use any of the
three commands
graph -T png < datafile | display
graph -T pnm < datafile | display
graph -T gif < datafile | display
to view the output file.
Another thing you can do is use graph -T tek to display a plot on a device that can em-
ulate a Tektronix 4014 graphics terminal. xterm, the X Window System terminal emulator,
can do this. Within an xterm window, you would type
graph -T tek < datafile
xterm normally emulates a VT100 terminal, but when this command is issued from
within it, it will pop up a second window (a ‘Tektronix window’) and draw the plot in it.
The Japanese terminal emulator kterm should be able to do the same, provided that it is
correctly installed. Another piece of software that can emulate a Tektronix 4014 terminal
is the MS-DOS version of kermit.
In the same way, you would use graph -T regis to display a plot on any graphics
terminal or emulator that supports ReGIS graphics. dxterm, the DECwindows terminal
emulator, can do this. Several DEC terminals (in particular the VT340, VT330, VT241,
and VT240 terminals) also support ReGIS graphics.
graph may behave differently depending on the environment in which it is invoked. We
have already mentioned the PAGESIZE environment variable, which affects the operation
of graph -T svg, graph -T ai, graph -T ps, graph -T cgm, graph -T fig, graph -T pcl,
and graph -T hpgl. Similarly, the BITMAPSIZE environment variable affects the operation
of graph -T X, graph -T png, graph -T pnm, and graph -T gif. The DISPLAY environment
variable affects the operation of graph -T X, and the TERM environment variable affects the
operation of graph -T tek. There are also several environment variables that affect the
operation of graph -T pcl and graph -T hpgl. For a complete discussion of the effects of
the environment on graph, see Section 2.7 [graph Environment], page 27. The following
remarks apply irrespective of which output format is specified.
By default, successive points in the dataset are joined by solid line segments, which form
a polygonal line or polyline that we call simply a ‘line’. You may choose the style of line
(the ‘linemode’) with the ‘-m’ option:
Chapter 2: The graph Application 7

graph -T ps -m 2 < datafile > plot.ps

Here ‘-m 2’ indicates that linemode #2 should be used. If the dataset is rendered in
monochrome, which is the default, the line can be drawn in one of five distinct styles.
Linemodes #1 through #5 signify solid, dotted, dotdashed, shortdashed, and longdashed;
thereafter the sequence repeats. If the ‘-C’ option is used, the dataset will be rendered in
color. For colored datasets, the line can be drawn in one of 25 distinct styles. Linemodes
#1 through #5 signify red, green, blue, magenta, and cyan; all are solid. Linemodes #6
through #10 signify the same five colors, but dotted rather than solid. Linemodes #11
through #16 signify the same five colors, but dotdashed, and so forth. After linemode #25,
the sequence repeats. Linemode #0, irrespective of whether the rendering is in monochrome
or color, means that the line is not drawn.
You may wish to fill the polygon bounded by the line (i.e., shade it, or fill it with a solid
color). For this, you would use the ‘-q’ option. For example,
echo .1 .1 .1 .9 .9 .9 .9 .1 .1 .1 |
graph -T ps -C -m 1 -q 0.3 > plot.ps
will plot a square region with vertices (0.1,0.1), (0.1,0.9), (0.9,0.9), and (0.9,0.1). The
repetition of the first vertex (0.1,0.1) at the end of the sequence of vertices ensures that
the square will be closed: all four segments of its boundary will be drawn. The square will
be drawn in red, since the colored version of linemode #1 is requested. The interior of the
square will be filled with red to an intensity of 30%, as the ‘-q 0.3’ option specifies. If the
intensity were 1.0, the region would be filled with solid color, and if it were 0.0, the region
would be filled with white. If the intensity were negative, the region would be unfilled, or
transparent (the default).
You may specify the thickness (‘width’) of the line, whether it is filled or not, by using
the ‘-W’ option. For example, ‘-W 0.01’ specifies that the line should have a thickness equal
to 0.01 times the size of the graphics display. Also, you may put symbols at each data point
along the line by doing, for example,
graph -T ps -S 3 0.1 < datafile > plot.ps
where the first argument 3 indicates which symbol to plot. The optional second argument
0.1 specifies the symbol size as a fraction of the size of the ‘plotting box’: the square within
which the plot is drawn. Symbol #1 is a dot, symbol #2 is a plus sign, symbol #3 is an
asterisk, symbol #4 is a circle, symbol #5 is a cross, and so forth. (See Section A.5 [Marker
Symbols], page 163.) Symbols 1 through 31 are the same for all display types, and the color
of a symbol will be the same as the color of the line it is plotted along.
Actually, you would probably not want to plot symbols at each point in the dataset
unless you turn off the line joining the points. For this purpose, the ‘negative linemode’
concept is useful. A line whose linemode is negative is not visible; however, any symbols
plotted along it will have the color associated with the corresponding positive linemode.
So, for example,
graph -T ps -C -m -3 -S 4 < datafile > plot.ps
will plot a blue circle at each data point. The circles will not be joined by line segments.
By adding the optional second argument to the ‘-S’ option, you may adjust the size of the
circles.
graph will automatically generate abscissa (i.e., x) values for you if you use the ‘-a’
option. If this option is used, no abscissa values should be given in the data file. The data
Chapter 2: The graph Application 8

points will be taken to be regularly spaced along the abscissa. The two arguments following
‘-a’ on the command line will be taken as the sampling interval and the abscissa value of the
first data point. If they are absent, they default to 1.0 and 0.0 respectively. For example,
the command
echo 0 1 0 | graph -T ps -a > plot.ps
produces exactly the same plot as
echo 0 0 1 1 2 0 | graph -T ps > plot.ps
If the ‘-I e’ option is specified, graph will plot data with error bars. In this case the
dataset should consist of triples (x,y,error ), rather than pairs (x, y). A vertical error bar of
the appropriate length will be plotted at each data point. You would plot a symbol at each
data point, along with the error bar, by using the ‘-S’ option in the usual way. The symbol
will be the same for each point in the dataset. You may use the ‘-a’ option in conjunction
with ‘-I e’, if you wish. If you do, the dataset should contain no abscissa (i.e., x) values.
By default, the limits on the x and y axes, and the spacing between the labeled ticks on
each axis, are computed automatically. You may wish to set them manually. You would
accomplish this with the ‘-x’ and ‘-y’ options.
echo 0 0 1 1 2 0 | graph -T ps -x -1 3 -y -1 2 > plot.ps
will produce a plot in which the x axis extends from −1 to 3, and the y axis from −1 to 2.
By default, graph tries to place about six numbered ticks on each axis. By including an
optional third argument to ‘-x’ or ‘-y’, you may manually set the spacing of the labeled
ticks. For example, using ‘-y -1 2 1’ rather than ‘-y -1 2’ will produce a y axis with labeled
ticks at −1, 0, 1, and 2, rather than at the locations that graph would choose by default,
which would be −1, −0.5, 0, 0.5, 1, 1.5, and 2. In general, if a third argument is present
then labeled ticks will be placed at each of its integer multiples.
To make an axis logarithmic, you would use the ‘-l’ option. For example,
echo 1 1 2 3 3 1 | graph -T ps -l x > plot.ps
will produce a plot in which the x axis is logarithmic, but the y axis is linear. To make
both axes logarithmic, you would use ‘-l x -l y’. By default, the upper and lower limits
on a logarithmic axis are powers of ten, and there are tick marks at each power of ten and
at its integer multiples. The tick marks at the powers of ten are labeled. If the axis spans
more than five orders of magnitude, the tick marks at the integer multiples are omitted.
If you have an unusually short logarithmic axis, you may need to increase the number
of labeled ticks. To do this, you should specify a tick spacing manually. For example, ‘-l x
-x 1 9 2’ would produce a plot in which the x axis is logarithmic and extends from 1 to 9.
Labeled ticks would be located at each integer multiple of 2, i.e., at 2, 4, 6, and 8.
You would label the x and y axes with the ‘-X’ and ‘-Y’ options, respectively. For
example,
echo 1 1 2 3 3 1 | graph -T ps -l x -X "A Logarithmic Axis" > plot.ps
will label the log axis in the preceding example. By default, the label for the y axis (if any)
will be rotated 90 degrees, unless you use the ‘-Q’ option. (Some X Window System displays,
both old and new, do not properly support rotated labels, and require the ‘-Q’ option.) You
may specify a ‘top label’, or title for the plot, by using the ‘-L’ option. Doing, for example,
echo 1 1 2 3 3 1 | graph -T ps -l x -L "A Simple Example" > plot.ps
Chapter 2: The graph Application 9

will produce a plot with a title on top.

The font size of the x axis and y axis labels may be specified with the ‘-f’ option, and
the font size of the title with the ‘--title-font-size’ option. For example,
echo 1 1 2 3 3 1 | graph -T ps -X "Abscissa" -f 0.1 > plot.ps
will produce a plot in which the font size of the x axis label, and each of the numerical tick
labels, is very large (0.1 times the size of the plotting box, i.e., the square within which the
plot is drawn).
The font in which the labels specified with the ‘-X’, ‘-Y’, and ‘-L’ options are drawn
can be specified with the ‘-F’ option. For example, ‘-F Times-Roman’ will make the labels
appear in Times-Roman instead of the default font (which is Helvetica, unless ‘-T png’, ‘-T
pnm’, ‘-T gif’, ‘-T pcl’, ‘-T hpgl’, ‘-T regis’, or ‘-T tek’ is specified). Font names are
case-insensitive, so ‘-F times-roman’ will work equally well. The available fonts include 35
Postscript fonts (for all variants of graph other than graph -T png, graph -T pnm, graph -T
gif, graph -T pcl, graph -T hpgl, graph -T regis, and graph -T tek), 45 PCL 5 fonts
(for graph -T svg, graph -T ai, graph -T pcl and graph -T hpgl), a number of Hewlett–
Packard vector fonts (for graph -T pcl and graph -T hpgl), and 22 Hershey vector fonts.
The Hershey fonts include HersheyCyrillic, for Russian, and HersheyEUC, for Japanese. For
a discussion of the available fonts, see Section A.1 [Text Fonts], page 144. The plotfont
utility will produce a character map of any available font. See Chapter 6 [plotfont], page 56.
The format of the labels drawn with the ‘-X’, ‘-Y’, and ‘-L’ options may be quite intricate.
Subscripts, superscripts, square roots, and switching fonts within a typeface are all allowed.
The above examples do not illustrate this, but for details, see Section A.4 [Text String
Format], page 151.
Each of the preceding examples produces a plot containing the default sort of grid (a
square plotting box, with ticks and labels drawn along its lower edge and its left edge).
There are actually several sorts of grid you may request. The ‘-g 0’, ‘-g 1’, ‘-g 2’, and
‘-g 3’ options yield successively fancier grids. What they yield, respectively, is no grid
at all, a pair of axes with ticks and labels, a square plotting box with ticks and labels, and
a square plotting box with ticks, labels, and grid lines. As you can check, ‘-g 2’ is the
default. There is also a ‘-g 4’ option, which yields a slightly different sort of grid: a pair of
axes that cross at the origin. This last sort of grid is useful when the x or y coordinates of
the data points you are plotting are both positive and negative.

2.2 Non-square, displaced, and rotated plots

To alter the linear dimensions of the plotting box, and also to position it in a different part
of the graphics display, you could do something like
graph -T ps -h .3 -w .6 -r .1 -u .1 < datafile > plot.ps
Here the ‘-h’ and ‘-w’ options specify the height and width of the plotting box, and the ‘-r’
and ‘-u’ options indicate how far up and to the right the lower left corner of the plotting box
should be positioned. All dimensions are expressed as fractions of the size of the graphics
display. By default, the height and width of the plotting box equal 0.6, and the ‘upward
shift’ and the ‘rightward shift’ equal 0.2. So the above example will produce a plot that
is half as tall as usual. Compared to its usual position, the plot will be shifted slightly
downward and to the left.
Chapter 2: The graph Application 10

Several command-line options specify sizes or dimensions as fractions of the size of the
plotting box. For example, ‘-S 3 .01’ specifies that the marker symbols for the following
dataset should be of type #3, and should have a font size equal to 0.01, i.e., 0.01 times
the minimum dimension (height or width) of the plotting box. If the ‘-h’ or ‘-w’ options
are employed to expand or contract the plot, such sizes or dimensions will scale in tandem.
That is presumably the right thing to do.
To rotate your plot by 90 degrees counterclockwise, you would add ‘--rotation 90’ to
the graph command line. You would specify ‘--rotation 180’ to produce an upside-down
plot. Any other angle may be specified, but angles other than 0, 90, 180, and 270 degrees
are of interest primarily to postmodernists. The ‘--rotation’ option may be combined
with the ‘-h’, ‘-w’, ‘-r’, and ‘-u’ options. If they appear together, the ‘--rotation’ option
takes effect first. That is because ‘--rotation’ specifies the rotation angle of the graphics
display, while the other options specify how the plotting box should be positioned within
the graphics display. The two sorts of positioning are logically distinct.
The graphics display (sometimes called the ‘viewport’) is an abstraction. For graph
-T X, it is a popped-up window on an X display. For graph -T pnm and graph -T gif, it is
a square or rectangular bitmap. In these three cases, the size of the graphics display can
be set by using the ‘--bitmap-size’ option, or by setting the BITMAPSIZE environment
variable. For graph -T tek, the graphics display is a square region occupying the central
part of a Tektronix display. (Tektronix displays are 4/3 times as wide as they are high.)
For graph -T regis, it is a square region occupying the central part of a ReGIS display.
For graph -T ai, graph -T ps, graph -T pcl, and graph -T fig, by default it is a 8-inch
square centered on an 8.5 in by 11 in page (US letter size). For graph -T hpgl, it is an
8-inch square, which by default is not centered. For graph -T svg and graph -T cgm, the
default graphics display is an 8-inch square, though if the output file is placed on a Web
page, it may be scaled arbitrarily.
The page size, which determines the default display size used by graph -T svg, graph
-T ai, graph -T ps, graph -T cgm, graph -T fig, graph -T pcl, and graph -T hpgl, can
be set by using the ‘--page-size’ option, or by setting the environment variable PAGESIZE.
For example, setting the page size to "a4" would produce output for an A4-size page (21 cm
by 29.7 cm), and would select a appropriate graphics display size. Either or both of the di-
mensions of the graphics display can be specified explicitly. For example, the page size could
be specified as "letter,xsize=4in", or "a4,xsize=10cm,ysize=15cm". The dimensions of the
graphics display are allowed to be negative (a negative dimension results in a reflection).
The position of the display on the page, relative to its default position, may optionally
be adjusted by specifying an offset vector. For example, the page size could be specified as
"letter,yoffset=1.2in", or "a4,xoffset=−5mm,yoffset=2.0cm". It is also possible to position
the graphics display precisely, by specifying the location of its lower left corner relative
to the lower left corner of the page. For example, the page size could be specified as
"letter,xorigin=2in,yorigin=3in", or "a4,xorigin=0.5cm,yorigin=0.5cm".
The preceding options may be intermingled. However, graph -T svg and graph -T cgm
ignore the "xoffset", "yoffset", "xorigin", and "yorigin" options, since SVG format and
WebCGM format have no notion of the Web page on which the graphics display will ul-
timately be positioned. They interpret the "xsize" and "ysize" options as specifying a
default size for the graphics display (it is merely a default, since the output file may be
scaled arbitrarily when it is placed on a Web page).
Chapter 2: The graph Application 11

For more information on page and graphics display sizes, see Appendix C [Page and
Viewport Sizes], page 167.

2.3 Preparing a plot from more than one dataset

It is frequently the case that several datasets need to be displayed on the same plot. If so,
you may wish to distinguish the points in different datasets by joining them by lines of
different types, or by using marker symbols of different types.
A more complicated example would be the following. You may have a file containing a
dataset that is the result of experimental observations, and a file containing closely spaced
points that trace out a theoretical curve. The second file is a dataset in its own right. You
would presumably plot it with line segments joining successive data points, so as to trace
out the theoretical curve. But the first dataset, resulting from experiment, would be plotted
without such line segments. In fact, a marker symbol would be plotted at each of its points.
These examples, and others like them, led us to define a set of seven attributes that define
the way a dataset should be plotted. These attributes, which can be set by command-line
options, are the following.
1. color/monochrome
2. linemode
3. linewidth
4. symbol type
5. symbol size
6. symbol font name
7. fill fraction
Color/monochrome (a choice of one or the other) is the simplest. The choice is toggled
with the ‘-C’ option. The ‘linemode’ (i.e., line style) specifies how the line segments joining
successive points should be drawn; it is specified with the ‘-m’ option. Linemode #0 means
no linemode at all, for example. ‘Linewidth’ means line thickness; it is specified with the
‘-W’ option. ‘Symbol type’ and ‘symbol size’, which are specified with the ‘-S’ option,
specify the symbol plotted at each point of the dataset. ‘Symbol font name’ refers to the
font from which marker symbols #32 and above, which are taken to be characters rather
than geometric symbols, are selected. It is set with the ‘--symbol-font-name’ option, and
is relevant only if ‘-S’ is used to request such special marker symbols. Finally, the polygonal
line joining the points in a dataset may be filled, to create a filled or shaded polygon. The
‘fill fraction’ is set with the ‘-q’ option. A negative fill fraction means no fill, or transparent;
zero means white, and 1.0 means solid, or fully colored.
The preceding seven attributes refer to the way in which datasets are plotted. Datasets
may also differ from one another in the way in which they are read from files. The dataset(s)
in a file may or may not contain error bars, for example. If a file contains data with error
bars, the ‘-I e’ option should occur on the command line before the file name. (The ‘-I’
option specifies the input format for the following files.)
The following illustrates how datasets in three different input files could be plotted
simultaneously.
graph -T ps -m 0 -S 3 file1 -C -m 3 file2 -C -W 0.02 file3 > output.ps
Chapter 2: The graph Application 12

The dataset in file1 will be plotted in linemode #0, so successive points will not be joined
by lines. But symbol #3 (an asterisk) will be plotted at each point. The dataset in file2
will be plotted in color, and linemode #3 will be used. In color plotting, linemode #3 is
interpreted as a solid blue line. The second ‘-C’ on the command line turns off color for
file3. The points in the third dataset will be joined by a black line with thickness 0.02,
as a fraction of the size (i.e., minimum dimension) of the graphics display.
The above command line could be made even more complicated by specifying additional
options (e.g., ‘-q’ or ‘-I’) before each file. In fact the command line could also include such
standard options as ‘-x’ or ‘-y’, which specify the range of each axis. Such options, which
refer to the plot as a whole rather than to individual datasets, should appear before the
first file name. For example, you could do
graph -T ps -x 0 1 0.5 -m 0 -S 3 file1 -C -m 3 file2 > output.ps
Note that it is possible to include the special file name ‘-’, which refers to standard input,
on the command line. So you may pipe the output of another program into graph. You
may even generate a plot in part from piped output, and in part from files.
Each input file may include more than one dataset. If so, the command line options
preceding a file on the command line will take effect for all datasets in that file. There
are two exceptions to this. By default, the linemode is incremented (‘bumped’) from one
dataset to the next. This feature is usually quite convenient. For example, if you do
graph -T ps -m 3 file1 > output.ps
the first dataset in file1 will appear in linemode #3, the second in linemode #4, etc.
In fact, if you do
graph -T ps file1 file2 ... > output.ps
without specifying linemode explicitly, the successive datasets read from the files on the
command line will appear in linemode #1, linemode #2, . . . . If you do not like this feature,
you may turn it off, or in general toggle it, by using the ‘-B’ option.
You may also control manually the linemode and symbol type used for the datasets
within any file. You would do this by including directives in the file itself, rather than on
the command line. For example, if the line
#m=-5,S=10
appeared in an ASCII-format input file, it would be interpreted as a directive to switch to
linemode #−5 and symbol type #10 for the following dataset. Future releases of graph
may provide the ability to set each of the seven dataset attributes in this way.

2.4 Multiplotting: placing multiple plots on a single page

It is occasionally useful to display several plots at once on a single page, or on a single
graphics display. We call such a composite plot a multiplot. One common sort of multiplot
is a small plot inset into a larger one. Another sort is two or more plots side by side.
graph can draw multiplots consisting of an arbitrarily large number of plots. When
multiplotting, graph draws each plot in its own ‘virtual display’. When an ordinary plot
is drawn, the virtual display is the same as the physical display. But when a plot of a
multiplot is drawn, the virtual display may be any smaller square region. The following
two-plot example illustrates the idea.
Chapter 2: The graph Application 13

graph -T X datafile1 --reposition .35 .35 .3 datafile2

Here datafile1 is plotted in the usual way. The ‘--reposition’ option, which serves as a
separator between plots, specifies that the second plot will be drawn in a virtual display. For
the purposes of the ‘--reposition’ option, the physical display is a square with lower left
corner (0.0,0.0) and upper right corner (1.0,1.0). In those coordinates the virtual display
will be a square of size 0.3, with lower left corner (0.35,0.35). So the second plot will be
inset into the first.
Just as the ‘-w’, ‘-h’, ‘-r’, and ‘-u’ options may be used to set the size and position of
a plotting box within the physical display, so they may be used to set the size and position
of a plotting box within a virtual display. For example,
graph -T X datafile1 --reposition .35 .35 .3 -w .4 -r .3 datafile2
will yield a two-plot multiplot in which the second plot is significantly different. Its plotting
box will have a width only 0.4 times the width of the virtual display. However, the plotting
box will be centered within the virtual display, since the distance between the left edge of
the plotting box and the left edge of the virtual display will be 0.3 times the width of the
virtual display.
By convention, before each plot of a multiplot other than the first is drawn, a ‘blankout
region’ surrounding its plotting box is erased. (That is, it is filled with white, or whatever
the background color is.) This erasure prevents the plots from overlapping and producing
a messy result. By default, the blankout region is a rectangular region 30% larger in each
dimension than the plotting box for the plot. That is appropriate if the plot is a small one
that is inset into the first plot. It may not be appropriate, however, if you are preparing a
multiplot in which several plots appear side by side. You may use the ‘--blankout’ option
to adjust this parameter. For example, specifying ‘--blankout 1.0’ will make the blankout
region for a plot coincide with its plotting box. Specifying ‘--blankout 0.0’ will prevent
any blanking out from occurring. The blankout parameter may be set more than once,
so as to differ from plot to plot.
It should be emphasized that every plot in a multiplot is a plot in its own right. All the
usual options (‘-m’, ‘-S’, ‘-x’, ‘-y’, etc.) can be applied to each plot separately. The options
for a plot should occur on the graph command line immediately after the ‘--reposition’
option that applies to it. Each plot may be prepared from more than a single dataset, also.
The names of the data files for each plot should occur on the command line before the
following ‘--reposition’ option, if any.

2.5 Reading binary and other data formats

By default, graph reads datasets in ASCII format. But it can also read datasets in any of
three binary formats (single precision floating point, double precision floating point, and
integer). These three input formats are specified by the ‘-I d’, ‘-I f’, and ‘-I i’ options,
respectively.
There are two advantages to using binary data: 1) graph runs significantly faster because
the computational overhead for converting data from ASCII to binary is eliminated, and
2) the input files may be significantly smaller. If you have very large datasets, using binary
format may reduce storage and runtime costs.
For example, you may create a single precision binary dataset as output from a C
language program:
Chapter 2: The graph Application 14

#include <stdio.h>
void write_point (float x, float y)
{
fwrite(&x, sizeof (float), 1, stdout);
fwrite(&y, sizeof (float), 1, stdout);
}
You may plot data written this way by doing:
graph -T ps -I f < binary_datafile > plot.ps
The inclusion of multiple datasets within a single binary file is supported. If a binary file
contains more than a single dataset, successive datasets should be separated by a single
occurrence of the the largest possible number. For single precision datasets this is the
quantity FLT_MAX, for double precision datasets it is the quantity DBL_MAX, and for integer
datasets it is the quantity INT_MAX. On most machines FLT_MAX is approximately 3.4×1038 ,
DBL_MAX is approximately 1.8 × 10308 , and INT_MAX is 231 − 1.
If you are reading datasets from more than one file, it is not required that the files be
in the same format. For example,
graph -T ps -I f binary_datafile -I a ascii_datafile > plot.ps
will read binary_datafile in ‘f’ (binary single precision) format, and datafile in ‘a’
(normal ASCII) format.
There is currently no support for reading and plotting binary data with error bars. If
you have data with error bars, you should supply the data to graph in ASCII, and use the
‘-I e’ option.
graph can also read data files in the ASCII ‘table’ format produced by the gnuplot
plotting program. For this, you should use the ‘-I g’ option. Such a data file may consist
of more than one dataset.
To sum up: there are six supported data formats, ‘a’ (normal ASCII), ‘e’ (ASCII with
error bars), ‘g’ (the ASCII ‘table’ format produced by gnuplot), ‘f’ (binary single precision),
‘d’ (binary double precision), and ‘i’ (binary integer). Input files may be in any of these
six formats.

2.6 graph command-line options

The graph program reads one or more datasets from files named on the command line or
from standard input, and prepares a plot. The output format is specified with the ‘-T’
option.
By default, graph reads ASCII data from the files specified on the command line. The
data are pairs of numbers, interpreted as the x and y coordinates of data points. If no files
are specified, or the file name ‘-’ is specified, the standard input is read. An output file is
written to standard output, unless the ‘-T X’ option is specified. In that case the graph is
displayed in a popped-up window on an X Window System display, and there is no output
file.
There are many command-line options for adjusting the visual appearance of the plot.
The relative order of file names and command-line options is important. Only the options
that precede a file name on the command line take effect for that file.
Chapter 2: The graph Application 15

The following sections list the possible options. Each option that takes an argument is
followed, in parentheses, by the type and default value of the argument. There are five sorts
of option.

1. Options affecting an entire plot. (See Section 2.6.1 [Plot Options], page 15.)
2. Options affecting the reading and drawing of individual datasets within a plot. (See
Section 2.6.2 [Dataset Options], page 22.)
3. Options for multiplotting (drawing several plots at once). (See Section 2.6.3 [Multiplot
Options], page 26.)
4. Options relevant only to raw graph, i.e., relevant only if no output format is specified
with the ‘-T’ option. (See Section 2.6.4 [Raw graph Options], page 26.)
5. Options requesting information (e.g., ‘--help’). (See Section 2.6.5 [Info Options],
page 26.)

2.6.1 Plot options

The following options affect an entire plot. They should normally occur at most once,
and should appear on the command line before the first file name. If a multiplot is being
drawn, they may (with the exception of the ‘-T’ option) occur more than once. If so, the
second and later occurrences should be placed on the command line immediately after each
‘--reposition x y’ option, which separates the plots in a multiplot.

‘-T type’
‘--output-format type’
(String, default "meta".) Select an output format of type type, which may
be one of the strings "X", "png", "pnm", "gif", "svg", "ai", "ps", "cgm",
"fig", "pcl", "hpgl", "regis", "tek", and "meta". These refer respectively to
the X Window System, PNG format, portable anymap (PBM/PGM/PPM) for-
mat, pseudo-GIF format, the XML-based Scalable Vector Graphics format, the
format used by Adobe Illustrator, idraw-editable Postscript, the WebCGM for-
mat for Web-based vector graphics, the format used by the xfig drawing editor,
the Hewlett–Packard PCL 5 printer language, the Hewlett–Packard Graphics
Language (by default, HP-GL/2), the ReGIS (remote graphics instruction set)
format developed by DEC, Tektronix format, and device-independent GNU
graphics metafile format. The option ‘--display-type’ is an obsolete alterna-
tive to ‘--output-format’.

‘-E x|y’
‘--toggle-axis-end x|y’
Set the position of the indicated axis to be on the other end of the plotting box
from what is currently the case. E.g., ‘-E y’ will cause the y axis to appear on
the right of the plot rather than the left, which is the default. Similarly, ‘-E x’
will cause the x axis to appear at the top of the plot rather than the bottom.
Note that if the x axis appears at the top, no plot title will be drawn, since
there will be no room.
Chapter 2: The graph Application 16

‘-f size’
‘--font-size size’
(Float, default 0.0525.) Set the size of the font used for the axis and tick labels
to be size. The size is specified as a fraction of the minimum dimension (width
or height) of the plotting box.

‘-F font_name’
‘--font-name font_name’
(String, default "Helvetica" except for graph -T pcl, for which "Univers" is
the default, and graph -T png, graph -T pnm, graph -T gif, graph -T hpgl,
graph -T regis, graph -T tek, and raw graph, for all of which "HersheySerif"
is the default.) Set the font used for the axis and tick labels, and for the plot
title (if any), to be font name. The choice of font for the plot title may be
overridden with the ‘--title-font-name’ option (see below). Font names are
case-insensitive. If the specified font is not available, the default font will be
used. Which fonts are available depends on which ‘-T’ option is used. For a
list of all fonts, see Section A.1 [Text Fonts], page 144. The plotfont utility
will produce a character map of any available font. See Chapter 6 [plotfont],
page 56.

‘-g grid_style’
‘--grid-style grid_style’
(Integer in the range 0. . . 4, default 2.) Set the grid style for the plot to be
grid style. Grid styles 0 through 3 are progressively more fancy, but style 4 is
a somewhat different style.
0. no axes, tick marks or labels.
1. a pair of axes, with tick marks and labels.
2. box around plot, with tick marks and labels.
3. box around plot, with tick marks and labels; also grid lines.
4. axes intersect at the origin, with tick marks and labels.

‘-h height’
‘--height-of-plot height’
(Float, default 0.6.) Set the fractional height of the plot with respect to the
height of the display (or virtual display, in the case of a multiplot) to be height.
A value of 1.0 will produce a plotting box that fills the entire available area.
Since labels and tick marks may be placed outside the plotting box, values
considerably less than 1.0 are normally chosen.

‘-H’
‘--toggle-frame-on-top’
Toggle whether or not a copy of the plot frame should be drawn on top of the
plot, as well as beneath it. This option is useful when the plotted dataset(s)
project slightly beyond the frame, which can happen if a large line thickness or
symbol size is specified.
Chapter 2: The graph Application 17

‘-k length’
‘--tick-size length’
(Float, default .02.) Set the length of the tick marks on each axis to be length.
A value of 1.0 produces tick marks whose length is equal to the minimum di-
mension (width or height) of the plotting box. A negative length yields tick
marks that extend outside the box, rather than inside.

‘-K clip_mode’
‘--clip-mode clip_mode’
(Integer, default 1.) Set the clip mode for the plot to clip mode. The clip mode
is relevant only if data points are being joined by a line, and the line is not
being filled to create a filled region (since filled regions are clipped in a fixed
way).
There are three clip modes: 0, 1, and 2. They have the same meaning as in the
gnuplot plotting program. Clip mode 0 means that a line segment joining two
data points will be plotted only if neither point is outside the plotting box. Clip
mode 1 means that it will be plotted if no more than one of the two points is
outside, and clip mode 2 means that it will be plotted even if both are outside.
In all three clip modes the line segment will be clipped to the plotting box.

‘-l x|y’
‘--toggle-log-axis x|y’
Set the specified axis to be a log axis rather than a linear axis, or vice versa.
By default, both axes are linear axes.

‘-L top_label’
‘--top-label top_label’
(String, default empty.) Place the text string top label above the plot, as its
‘top label’, i.e., title. The string may include escape sequences (see Section A.4
[Text String Format], page 151). The ‘--title-font-size’ option may be
used to specify the size of the font. The font is normally the same as the font
used for labeling axes and ticks, as selected by the ‘-F’ option. But this can be
overridden with the ‘--title-font-name’ option.

‘-N x|y’
‘--toggle-no-ticks x|y’
Toggle the presence of ticks and tick labels on the specified axis. This applies
to the grid styles that normally include ticks and tick labels, i.e., grid styles 1,
2, 3, and 4.

‘-Q’
‘--toggle-rotate-y-label’
Position the label on the y axis (which is set with the ‘-Y’ option) horizontally
instead of vertically, or vice versa. By default, the label is rotated, so that it
is parallel to the y axis. But some output devices (e.g., old X Window System
displays, and buggy new ones) cannot handle rotated fonts. So if you specify
‘-T X’, you may also need ‘-Q’.
Chapter 2: The graph Application 18

‘-r right’
‘--right-shift right’
(Float, default 0.2.) Move the plot to the right by a fractional amount right with
respect to the width of the display (or virtual display, in the case of a multiplot).
This produces a margin on the left side of the plotting box. A value of 0.5 will
produce a margin half the width of the available area. Note that the tick marks
and labels are drawn in the margin.
‘-R x|y’
‘--toggle-round-to-next-tick x|y’
Toggle whether or not the upper and lower limits of the specified axis should be
expanded, so that they both become integer multiples of the spacing between
labeled tick marks.
This option is meaningful whenever the user specifies either or both of the limits,
by using the ‘-x’ or ‘-y’ option. If the user leaves both limits unspecified, they
will always be chosen to satisfy the ‘integer multiple’ constraint.
‘-s’
‘--save-screen’
Save the screen. This option requests that graph not erase the output device
before it begins to plot.
This option is relevant only to graph -T tek and raw graph. Tektronix displays
and emulators are persistent, in the sense that previously drawn graphics remain
visible. So by repeatedly using graph -T tek -s, you can build up a multiplot.
‘-t’
‘--toggle-transpose-axes’
Transpose the abscissa and ordinate. This causes the axes to be interchanged,
and the options that apply to each axis to be applied to the opposite axis. That
is, data points are read in as (y, x) pairs, and such options as ‘-x’ and ‘-X’ apply
to the y axis rather than the x axis. If the ‘-I e’ option is in force, so that the
data points are read with error bars, the orientation of the error bars will be
switched between vertical and horizontal.
‘-u up’
‘--upward-shift up’
(Float, default 0.2.) Move the plot up by a fractional amount up with respect
to the height of the display (or virtual display, in the case of a multiplot). This
produces a margin below the plotting box. A value of 0.5 will produce a margin
half the height of the available area. Note that the tick marks and labels are
drawn in the margin.
‘-w width’
‘--width-of-plot width’
(Float, default 0.6.) Set the fractional width of the plot with respect to the
width of the display (or virtual display, in the case of a multiplot) to be width.
A value of 1.0 will produce a plotting box that fills the entire available area.
Since labels and tick marks may be placed outside the plotting box, values
considerably less than 1.0 are normally chosen.
Chapter 2: The graph Application 19

‘-x [lower_limit [upper_limit [spacing]]]’

‘--x-limits [lower_limit [upper_limit [spacing]]]’
(Floats.) The arguments lower limit and upper limit specify the limits of the
x axis, and the optional argument spacing specifies the spacing of labeled ticks
along the axis. If any of the three arguments is missing or is supplied as ‘-’ (i.e.,
as a single hyphen), it is computed from the data. Both arguments lower limit
and upper limit must be present if graph is to act as a real-time filter.
By default, the supplied limit(s) are strictly respected. However, the ‘-R x’
option may be used to request that they be rounded to the nearest integer
multiple of the spacing between labeled ticks. The lower limit will be rounded
downward, and the upper limit upward.
‘-X x_label’
‘--x-label x_label’
(String, default empty.) Set the label for the x axis to be the text string x label.
The string may include escape sequences (see Section A.4 [Text String Format],
page 151). The ‘-F’ and ‘-f’ options may be used to specify the name of the
font and the size of the font.
‘-y [lower_limit [upper_limit [spacing]]]’
‘--y-limits [lower_limit [upper_limit [spacing]]]’
(Floats.) The arguments specify the limits of the y axis, and the spacing of
labeled ticks along it, as for the x axis (see above). Both arguments lower limit
and upper limit must be present if graph is to act as a real-time filter.
By default, the supplied limit(s) are strictly respected. However, the ‘-R y’
option may be used to request that they be rounded to the nearest multiple
of the tick spacing. The lower limit will be rounded downward, and the upper
limit upward.
‘-Y y_label’
‘--y-label y_label’
(String, default empty.) Set the label for the y axis to be the text string y label.
The string may include escape sequences (see Section A.4 [Text String Format],
page 151). The label will be rotated by 90 degrees so that it is parallel to the
axis, unless the ‘-Q’ option is used. (Some X Window System displays, both
old and new, do not properly support rotated labels, so that if you specify ‘-T
X’, you may also need ‘-Q’.) The ‘-F’ and ‘-f’ options can be used to specify
the name of the font and the size of the font.
‘--bg-color name’
(String, default "white".) Set the color used for the plot background to be
name. This is relevant only to graph -T X, graph -T png, graph -T pnm, graph
-T gif, graph -T cgm, graph -T regis, and graph -T meta. An unrecognized
name sets the color to the default. For information on what names are rec-
ognized, see Appendix B [Color Names], page 166. The environment variable
BG_COLOR can equally well be used to specify the background color.
If the ‘-T png’ or ‘-T gif’ option is used, a transparent PNG file or a transparent
pseudo-GIF, respectively, may be produced by setting the TRANSPARENT_COLOR
environment variable to the name of the background color. See Section 2.7
Chapter 2: The graph Application 20

[graph Environment], page 27. If the ‘-T svg’ or ‘-T cgm’ option is used, an
output file without a background may be produced by setting the background
color to "none".
‘--bitmap-size bitmap_size’
(String, default "570x570".) Set the size of the graphics display in which the
plot will be drawn, in terms of pixels, to be bitmap size. This is relevant
only to graph -T X, graph -T png, graph -T pnm, and graph -T gif, for all of
which the size can be expressed in terms of pixels. The environment variable
BITMAPSIZE may equally well be used to specify the size.
The graphics display used by graph -T X is a popped-up X window.
Command-line positioning of this window on an X Window System display is
supported. For example, if bitmap size is "570x570+0+0" then the window
will be popped up in the upper left corner.
If you choose a rectangular (non-square) window size, the fonts in the plot will
be scaled anisotropically, i.e., by different factors in the horizontal and vertical
direction. Any font that cannot easily be anisotropically scaled will be replaced
by a default scalable font, such as the Hershey vector font "HersheySerif".
For backward compatibility, graph -T X allows the user to set the window
size and position by setting the X resource Xplot.geometry, instead of
‘--bitmap-size’ or BITMAPSIZE.
‘--emulate-color option’
(String, default "no".) If option is "yes", replace each color in the output by
an appropriate shade of gray. This is seldom useful, except when using ‘graph
-T pcl’ to prepare output for a PCL 5 device. (Many monochrome PCL 5
devices, such as monochrome LaserJets, do a poor job of emulating color on
their own. They usually map HP-GL/2’s seven standard pen colors, including
even yellow, to black.) You may equally well request color emulation by setting
the environment variable EMULATE_COLOR to "yes".
‘--frame-color name’
(String, default "black".) Set the color used for drawing the plot frame, and
for drawing monochrome datasets (if any) to be name. An unrecognized name
sets the color to the default. For information on what names are recognized,
see Appendix B [Color Names], page 166.
‘--frame-line-width frame_line_width’
(Float, default −1.0.) Set the thickness of lines in the plot frame, as a fraction of
the size (i.e., minimum dimension) of the graphics display, to frame line width.
A negative value means that the default value for the line thickness provided
by the GNU libplot graphics library should be used. This is usually 1/850
times the size of the display, although if ‘-T X’, ‘-T png’, ‘-T pnm’, or ‘-T gif’
is specified, it is zero. By convention, a zero-thickness line is the thinnest line
that can be drawn. This is the case in all output formats. Note, however, that
the drawing editors idraw and xfig treat zero-thickness lines as invisible.
graph -T tek and graph -T regis do not support drawing lines with other
than a default thickness, and graph -T hpgl does not support doing so if the
environment variable HPGL_VERSION is set to a value less than "2" (the default).
Chapter 2: The graph Application 21

‘--max-line-length max_line_length’
(Integer, default 500.) Set the maximum number of points that a polygonal
line drawn through any dataset may contain, before it is flushed to the output
device, to equal max line length. If this flushing occurs, the polygonal line will
be split into two or more sub-lines, though the splitting should not be noticeable.
Splitting will not take place if the ‘-q’ option, which requests filling, is used.
The reason for splitting long polygonal lines is that some display devices (e.g.,
old Postscript printers and HP-GL pen plotters) have limited buffer sizes. The
environment variable MAX_LINE_LENGTH can also be used to specify the max-
imum line length. This option has no effect on graph -T tek or raw graph,
since they draw polylines in real time and have no buffer limitations.
‘--page-size pagesize’
(String, default "letter".) Set the size of the page on which the plot will be posi-
tioned. This is relevant only to graph -T svg, graph -T ai, graph -T ps, graph
-T cgm, graph -T fig, graph -T pcl, and graph -T hpgl. "letter" means an
8.5 in by 11 in page. Any ISO page size in the range "a0". . . "a4" or ANSI
page size in the range "a". . . "e" may be specified ("letter" is an alias for "a"
and "tabloid" is an alias for "b"). "legal", "ledger", and "b5" are recognized
page sizes also. The environment variable PAGESIZE can equally well be used
to specify the page size.
For graph -T ai, graph -T ps, graph -T pcl, and graph -T fig, the graph-
ics display (or ‘viewport’) within which the plot is drawn will be, by de-
fault, a square region centered on the specified page. For graph -T hpgl,
it will be a square region of the same size, but may be positioned differ-
ently. Either or both of the dimensions of the graphics display can be spec-
ified explicitly. For example, pagesize could be specified as "letter,xsize=4in",
or "a4,xsize=10cm,ysize=15cm". The dimensions are allowed to be negative
(a negative dimension results in a reflection).
The position of the graphics display, relative to its default position, may option-
ally be adjusted by specifying an offset vector. For example, pagesize could be
specified as "letter,yoffset=1.2in", or "a4,xoffset=−5mm,yoffset=2.0cm". It is
also possible to position the graphics display precisely, by specifying the loca-
tion of its lower left corner relative to the lower left corner of the page. For
example, pagesize could be specified as "letter,xorigin=2in,yorigin=3in", or
"a4,xorigin=0.5cm,yorigin=0.5cm". The preceding options may be intermin-
gled.
graph -T svg and graph -T cgm ignore the "xoffset", "yoffset", "xorigin", and
"yorigin" options, since SVG format and WebCGM format have no notion of the
Web page on which the graphics display will ultimately be positioned. However,
they do respect the "xsize" and "ysize" options. For more on page sizes, see
Appendix C [Page and Viewport Sizes], page 167.
‘--pen-colors colors’
(String, default "1=red:2=green:3=blue:4=magenta:5=cyan".) Set the colors
of the pens used for drawing plots, as numbered, to be colors. The format
should be self-explanatory. An unrecognized name sets the corresponding color
Chapter 2: The graph Application 22

to the default. For information on what names are recognized, see Appendix B
[Color Names], page 166.
‘--rotation angle’
(Integer, default 0.) Set the rotation angle of the graphics display to be angle
degrees. The rotation is counterclockwise. The environment variable ROTATION
can equally well be used to specify the rotation angle.
This option is used for switching between portrait and landscape orientations,
which have rotation angles 0 and 90 degrees respectively. Postmodernists may
also find it useful.
‘--title-font-name font_name’
(String, default "Helvetica" except for graph -T pcl, for which "Univers" is the
default, and graph -T png, graph -T pnm, graph -T gif, graph -T hpgl, graph
-T regis, and graph -T tek, for all of which "HersheySerif" is the default.) Set
the font used for the plot title to be font name. Normally the font used for the
plot title is the same as that used for labeling the axes and the ticks along the
axes, as specified by the ‘-F’ option. But the ‘--title-font-name’ option can
be used to override this. Font names are case-insensitive. If the specified font is
not available, the default font will be used. Which fonts are available depends
on which ‘-T’ option is used. For a list of all fonts, see Section A.1 [Text Fonts],
page 144. The plotfont utility will produce a character map of any available
font. See Chapter 6 [plotfont], page 56.
‘--title-font-size size’
(Float, default 0.07.) Set the size of the font used for the top label (‘title’), as
specified by the ‘-L’ option, to be size. The size is specified as a fraction of the
minimum dimension (width or height) of the plotting box.

2.6.2 Dataset options

The following options affect the way in which individual datasets are read from files, and
drawn as part of a plot. They should appear on the command line before the file containing
the datasets whose reading or rendering they will affect. They may appear more than once
on a command line, if more than one file is to be read.
The following three options affect the way in which datasets are read from files.
‘-I data-format’
‘--input-format data-format’
This specifies which format the subsequent input file(s) are in.
‘a’ ASCII format. Each input file is a sequence of floating point num-
bers, interpreted as the x and y coordinates of the successive data
points in a dataset. The x and y coordinates of a point need not
appear on the same line, and points need not appear on different
lines. But if a blank line occurs (i.e., two newlines in succession are
seen), it is interpreted as the end of a dataset, and the beginning
of the next.
‘e’ ASCII format, including error bars. Similar to ‘a’ format, except
that triples (x,y,error ) appear instead of pairs (x, y).
Chapter 2: The graph Application 23

‘g’ The ASCII ‘table’ format produced by the gnuplot plotting pro-
gram.
‘f’ Single precision binary format. Each input file is a sequence of
single precision floating point numbers, interpreted as forming pairs
(x,y). Successive datasets are separated by a single occurrence of
the quantity FLT_MAX, which is the largest possible single precision
floating point number. On most machines this is approximately
3.4 × 1038 .
‘d’ Double precision binary format. Each input file is a sequence of
double precision floating point numbers, interpreted as forming
pairs (x,y). Successive datasets are separated by a single occur-
rence of the quantity DBL_MAX, which is the largest possible double
precision floating point number. On most machines this is approx-
imately 1.8 × 10308 .
‘i’ Integer binary format. Each input file is a sequence of integers, in-
terpreted as forming pairs (x,y). Successive datasets are separated
by a single occurrence of the quantity INT_MAX, which is the largest
possible integer. On most machines this is 231 − 1.
‘-a [step_size [lower_limit]]’
‘--auto-abscissa [step_size [lower_limit]]’
(Floats, defaults 1.0 and 0.0.) Automatically generate abscissa (x) values. Ir-
respective of data format (‘a’, ‘e’, ‘f’, ‘d’, or ‘i’), this option specifies that the
abscissa (x) values are missing from the input file: the dataset(s) to be read
contain only ordinate (y) values. The increment from each x value to the next
will be step size, and the first x value will be lower limit. To return to reading
abscissa values from the input, i.e., for subsequent input files, you would use
‘-a 0’, which disables automatic generation of the abscissa values and returns
step size and lower limit to their default values.
‘-B’
‘--toggle-auto-bump’
By default, the linemode (set with ‘-m’, see below) is ‘bumped’ (incremented by
unity) at the beginning of each new dataset. This option toggles auto-bumping:
it turns it off if it was on, and on if it was off.
The following options affect the way in which individual datasets are drawn as part of
a plot. These options set the six ‘attributes’ (symbol type, symbol font, linemode, line
thickness, fill fraction, and color/monochrome) that each dataset has.
‘-m line_mode’
‘--line-mode line_mode’
(Integer, default 1.) line mode specifies the mode (i.e., style) of the lines drawn
between successive points in a dataset. By convention, linemode #0 means no
line at all (data points are disconnected). If the dataset is being rendered in
monochrome, the interpretation of line mode is as follows.
1. solid
Chapter 2: The graph Application 24

2. dotted
3. dotdashed
4. shortdashed
5. longdashed
Thereafter (i.e., for line mode greater than 5) the sequence of five linemodes
repeats. So besides linemode #0, there are a total of five distinct monochrome
linemodes. If the dataset is being rendered in color (as may be requested with
the ‘-C’ option), the interpretation of linemodes #1 through #5 is instead
1. red, solid
2. green, solid
3. blue, solid
4. magenta, solid
5. cyan, solid
Linemodes #6 through #10 use the same five colors, but are dotted; linemodes
#11 through #15 are dotdashed; linemodes #16 through #20 are shortdashed;
and linemodes #21 through #25 are longdashed. So besides linemode #0, there
are a total of 25 distinct colored linemodes. A negative linemode indicates that
no line should be drawn, but that the marker symbol, if any (see below), should
be in the color of the corresponding positive linemode.
‘-S [symbol_number [symbol_size]]’
‘--symbol [symbol_number [symbol_size]]’
(Integer and float, defaults 0 and 0.03.) Draw a marker symbol at each data
point. symbol number specifies the symbol type, and symbol size specifies
the font size of the symbol, as a fraction of the minimum dimension (width or
height) of the plotting box. If the dataset is being rendered in color, the symbol
will have the color of the line that is being drawn to connect the data points.
If you use the ‘-S’ option, you would usually also use the ‘-m’ option, to request
that the symbols be drawn without any line connecting them. By specifying
a negative argument to ‘-m’ (a ‘negative linemode’), you may obtain colored
symbols.
The following table lists the first few symbols (by convention, symbol #0 means
no symbol at all).
1. dot ( · )
2. plus (+)
3. asterisk (∗)
4. circle (◦)
5. cross (×)
Marker symbols 0. . . 31 are furnished by the GNU libplot graphics library.
See Section A.5 [Marker Symbols], page 163. Symbol numbers greater than or
equal to 32 are interpreted as characters in a symbol font, which can be set
with the ‘--symbol-font-name’ option (see below).
Chapter 2: The graph Application 25

‘-W line_width’
‘--line-width line_width’
(Float, default −1.0.) Set the thickness of the lines used to join successive points
in a dataset, as a fraction of the size (i.e., minimum dimension) of the graphics
display, to line width. A negative value means that the default value for the
line thickness provided by the GNU libplot graphics library should be used.
This is usually 1/850 times the size of the display, although if ‘-T X’, ‘-T png’,
‘-T pnm’, or ‘-T gif’ is specified, it is zero. By convention, a zero-thickness line
is the thinnest line that can be drawn. This is the case in all output formats.
Note, however, that the drawing editors idraw and xfig treat zero-thickness
lines as invisible.
graph -T tek and graph -T regis do not support drawing lines with other
than a default thickness, and graph -T hpgl does not support doing so if the
environment variable HPGL_VERSION is set to a value less than "2" (the default).
‘-q fill_fraction’
‘--fill-fraction fill_fraction’
(Float, default −1.0.) If successive points in a dataset are joined by line seg-
ments, set the shading intensity for the polygon formed by the line segments
to be fill fraction. A solid polygon (i.e., one filled with the ‘pen color’ used
for drawing the line segments) is obtained by choosing fill fraction=1.0. The
interior of the polygon will be white if fill fraction=0.0. The polygon will be
unfilled (transparent) if fill fraction is negative.
If the polygon intersects itself, the ‘even-odd fill rule’ will normally be used to
determine which points are inside rather than outside, i.e., to determine which
portions of the polygon should be shaded. The even-odd fill rule is explained
in the Postscript Language Reference Manual.
The ‘-q’ option has no effect on graph -T tek, and it is only partly effective in
graph -T hpgl if the environment variable HPGL_VERSION is set to a value less
than "2" (the default).
‘-C’
‘--toggle-use-color’
Toggle between color and monochrome rendering of datasets. The interpreta-
tion of linemode depends on whether the rendering is being performed in color
or monochrome; see the ‘-m’ option above.
‘--symbol-font-name symbol_font_name’
(String, default "ZapfDingbats" unless ‘-T png’, ‘-T pnm’, ‘-T gif’, ‘-T pcl’,
‘-T hpgl’, ‘-T regis’, or -T tek is specified, in which case it is "HersheySerif".)
Set the symbol font, from which marker symbols numbered 32 and higher are
selected, to be symbol font name. Font names are case-insensitive. If the speci-
fied font is not available, the default font will be used. Which fonts are available
depends on which ‘-T’ option is used. For example, if the ‘-T pcl’ or ‘-T hpgl’
option is used then normally the Wingdings font, which is an alternative source
of symbols, becomes available. For a list of all fonts, see Section A.1 [Text
Fonts], page 144. The plotfont utility will produce a character map of any
available font. See Chapter 6 [plotfont], page 56.
Chapter 2: The graph Application 26

2.6.3 Multiplot options

The following options are used for multiplotting (placing more than a single plots on a
display, or a page). The ‘--reposition’ directive serves as a separator, on the command
line, between the options and file names that apply to successive plots.
‘--reposition x y size’
(Floats, defaults 0.0, 0.0, 1.0) Set the ‘virtual display’ within which the next
plot will be drawn to be a square of size size, with lower left corner (x,y).
Normalized coordinates are used here: (0,0) means the lower left corner of the
physical display and (1,1) means the upper right corner of the physical display.
The size of the plot within the virtual display may be adjusted with the ‘-h’ and
‘-w’ options, and its position within the virtual display with the ‘-u’ and ‘-w’
options. After a ‘--reposition’ directive, the arguments of those four options
will be interpreted in terms of the virtual display, not the physical display.
‘--blankout blankout_fraction’
(Float, default 1.3.) Before each additional plot of a multiplot is drawn,
the region of the display that the plot will occupy is cleared. If blank-
out fraction=1.3, a region 30% larger in each dimension is cleared. If, for
example, blankout fraction=1.0, the region covered by the plot’s plotting box,
and no more, is cleared. The default value, 1.3, is appropriate for inset plots.
1.0 would be appropriate for side by side plots.
graph -T tek cannot clear regions, and graph -T hpgl cannot clear them if the
environment variables HPGL_VERSION and HPGL_OPAQUE_MODE are set to non-
default values (i.e., values other than "2" and "yes", respectively).

2.6.4 Raw graph options

The following option is relevant only to raw graph, i.e., is relevant only if no output format
is specified with the ‘-T’ option. In this case graph outputs a graphics metafile, which
may be translated to other formats by invoking plot. This option should appear on the
command line before any file names, since it affects the output of the plot (or multiplot) as
a whole.
‘-O’
‘--portable-output’
Output the portable (human-readable) version of GNU metafile format, rather
than a binary version (the default). This can also be requested by setting the
environment variable META_PORTABLE to "yes".

2.6.5 Informational options

The following options request information.
‘--help’ Print a list of command-line options, and then exit.
‘--help-fonts’
Print a table of available fonts, and then exit. The table will depend on which
output format is specified with the ‘-T’ option. graph -T X, graph -T svg,
graph -T ai, graph -T ps, graph -T cgm, and graph -T fig each support the
35 standard Postscript fonts. graph -T svg, graph -T ai, graph -T pcl, and
Chapter 2: The graph Application 27

graph -T hpgl support the 45 standard PCL 5 fonts, and graph -T pcl and
graph -T hpgl support a number of Hewlett–Packard vector fonts. All of the
preceding, together with graph -T png, graph -T pnm, graph -T gif, graph -T
regis, and graph -T tek, support a set of 22 Hershey vector fonts. Raw graph
in principle supports any of these fonts, since its output must be translated to
other formats with plot. The plotfont utility will produce a character map
of any available font. See Chapter 6 [plotfont], page 56.
‘--list-fonts’
Like ‘--help-fonts’, but lists the fonts in a single column to facilitate piping
to other programs. If no output format is specified with the ‘-T’ option, the
full set of supported fonts is listed.
‘--version’
Print the version number of graph and the plotting utilities package, and exit.

2.7 Environment variables

The behavior of graph is affected by several environment variables. We have
already mentioned the environment variables BITMAPSIZE, PAGESIZE, BG_COLOR,
EMULATE_COLOR, MAX_LINE_LENGTH, and ROTATION. They serve as backups for the
several options ‘--bitmap-size’, ‘--page-size’, ‘--bg-color’, ‘--emulate-color’,
‘--max-line-length’, and ‘--rotation’. The remaining environment variables are
specific to individual output formats.
graph -T X, which pops up a window on an X Window System display and draws graph-
ics in it, checks the DISPLAY environment variable. The value of this variable determines
the display on which the window will be popped up.
graph -T png and graph -T gif, which produce output in PNG and pseudo-GIF format
respectively, are affected by two environment variables. If the value of the INTERLACE
variable is "yes", the output file will be interlaced. Also, if the value of the TRANSPARENT_
COLOR environment variable is the name of a color that appears in the output file, that color
will be treated as transparent by most applications. For information on what color names
are recognized, see Appendix B [Color Names], page 166.
graph -T pnm, which produces output in Portable Anymap (PBM/PGM/PPM) format,
is affected by the PNM_PORTABLE environment variable. If its value is "yes", the output file
will be in the portable (human readable) version of PBM, PGM, or PPM format, rather
than the default (binary) version.
graph -T cgm, which produces CGM files that comply with the WebCGM profile for
Web-based vector graphics, is affected by two environment variables. By default, a version 3
CGM file is generated. Many older CGM interpreters and viewers, such as the ones built
into Microsoft Office and other commercial software, only support version 1 CGM files. The
CGM_MAX_VERSION environment variable may be set to "1", "2", "3", or "4" (the default) to
specify an maximum value for the version number. The CGM_ENCODING variable may also be
set, to specify the type of encoding used in the CGM file. Supported values are "clear text"
(i.e., human readable) and "binary" (the default). The WebCGM profile requires that the
binary encoding be used.
graph -T pcl, which produces PCL 5 output for Hewlett–Packard printers, is affected by
the environment variable PCL_ASSIGN_COLORS. It should be set to "yes" when producing
Chapter 2: The graph Application 28

PCL 5 output for a color printer or other color device. This will ensure accurate color
reproduction by giving the output device complete freedom in assigning colors, internally,
to its “logical pens”. If it is "no" then the device will use a fixed set of colored pens, and will
emulate other colors by shading. The default is "no" because monochrome PCL 5 devices,
which are more common than colored ones, must use shading to emulate color.
graph -T hpgl, which produces Hewlett–Packard Graphics Language output, is also
affected by several environment variables. The most important is HPGL_VERSION, which
may be set to "1", "1.5", or "2" (the default). "1" means that the output should be generic
HP-GL, "1.5" means that the output should be suitable for the HP7550A graphics plotter
and the HP758x, HP7595A and HP7596A drafting plotters (HP-GL with some HP-GL/2
extensions), and "2" means that the output should be modern HP-GL/2. If the version is
"1" or "1.5" then the only available fonts will be vector fonts, and all lines will be drawn
with a default thickness (the ‘-W’ option will not work). Additionally, if the version is "1"
then the filling of arbitrary curves with solid color will not be supported (the ‘-q’ option
may be used to fill circles and rectangles aligned with the coordinate axes, though).
The position of the graph -T hpgl graphics display on the page can be rotated 90 degrees
counterclockwise by setting the HPGL_ROTATE environment variable to "yes". This is not
the same as the rotation obtained with the ‘--rotation’ option, since it both rotates the
graphics display and repositions its lower left corner toward another corner of the page.
Besides "no" and "yes", recognized values for the HPGL_ROTATE variable are "0", "90",
"180", and "270". "no" and "yes" are equivalent to "0" and "90", respectively. "180" and
"270" are supported only if HPGL_VERSION is "2" (the default).
Opaque filling and the drawing of visible white lines are supported only if HPGL_VERSION
is "2" (the default) and the environment variable HPGL_OPAQUE_MODE is "yes" (the default).
If the value is "no" then opaque filling will not be used, and white lines (if any), which
are normally drawn with pen #0, will not be drawn. This feature is to accommodate older
HP-GL/2 devices. HP-GL/2 pen plotters, for example, do not support opacity or the use
of pen #0 to draw visible white lines. Some older HP-GL/2 devices reportedly malfunction
if asked to draw opaque objects.
By default, graph -T hpgl will draw with a fixed set of pens. Which pens are present
may be specified by setting the HPGL_PENS environment variable. If HPGL_VERSION is "1",
the default value of HPGL_PENS is "1=black"; if HPGL_VERSION is "1.5" or "2", the default
value of HPGL_PENS is "1=black:2=red:3=green:4=yellow:5=blue:6=magenta:7=cyan".
The format should be self-explanatory. By setting HPGL_PENS, you may specify a color for
any pen in the range #1. . . #31. For information on what color names are recognized, see
Appendix B [Color Names], page 166. Pen #1 must always be present, though it need not
be black. Any pen in the range #2. . . #31 may be omitted.
If HPGL_VERSION is "2" then graph -T hpgl will also be affected by the environment
variable HPGL_ASSIGN_COLORS. If the value of this variable is "yes", then graph -T hpgl
will not be restricted to the palette specified in HPGL_PENS: it will assign colors to “logical
pens” in the range #1. . . #31, as needed. The default value is "no" because other than color
LaserJet printers and DesignJet plotters, not many HP-GL/2 devices allow the assignment
of colors to logical pens. In particular, HP-GL/2 pen plotters do not.
graph -T tek, which produces output for a Tektronix terminal or emulator, checks the
TERM environment variable. If the value of TERM is a string beginning with "xterm", "nx-
term", or "kterm", it is taken as a sign that graph is running in an X Window System
Chapter 2: The graph Application 29

VT100 terminal emulator: an xterm, nxterm, or kterm. Before drawing graphics, graph -T
tek will emit an escape sequence that causes the terminal emulator’s auxiliary Tektronix
window, which is normally hidden, to pop up. After the graphics are drawn, an escape
sequence that returns control to the original VT100 window will be emitted. The Tektronix
window will remain on the screen.
If the value of TERM is a string beginning with "kermit", "ansi.sys", or "nansi.sys",
it is taken as a sign that graph is running in the VT100 terminal emulator provided by
the MS-DOS version of kermit. Before drawing graphics, graph -T tek will emit an es-
cape sequence that switches the terminal emulator to Tektronix mode. Also, some of the
Tektronix control codes emitted by graph -T tek will be kermit-specific. There will be a
limited amount of color support, which is not normally the case (the 16 ansi.sys colors
will be supported). After drawing graphics, graph -T tek will emit an escape sequence
that returns the emulator to VT100 mode. The key sequence ‘ALT minus’ can be employed
manually within kermit to switch between the two modes.
Chapter 3: The plot Program 30

3 The plot Program

3.1 How to use plot

The GNU plot filter plot displays GNU graphics metafiles or translates them to other
formats. It will take input from files specified on the command line or from standard input.
The ‘-T’ option is used to specify the desired output format. Supported output formats
include "X", "png", "pnm", "gif", "svg", "ai", "ps", "cgm", "fig", "pcl", "hpgl", "regis",
"tek", and "meta" (the default).
The metafile format is a device-independent format for storage of vector graphics. By
default, it is a binary rather than a human-readable format (see Appendix D [Metafiles],
page 169). Each of the graph, pic2plot, tek2plot, and plotfont utilities will write a
graphics metafile to standard output if no ‘-T’ option is specified on its command line.
The GNU libplot graphics library may also be used to produce metafiles. Metafiles may
contain arbitrarily many pages of graphics, but each metafile produced by graph contains
only a single page.
plot, like the metafile format itself, is useful if you wish to preserve a vector graphics
file, and display or edit it with more than one drawing editor. The following example shows
how you may do this.
To produce a plot of data arranged as alternating x and y coordinates in an ASCII file,
you may use graph as follows:
graph < datafile > test.meta
The file ‘test.meta’ will be a single-page graphics metafile. Similarly, to create in metafile
format a plot consisting of a simple figure, you may do:
echo 0 0 1 1 2 0 | spline | graph > test.meta
To display any such plot on an X Window System display, you would do
plot -T X test.meta
or
plot -T X < test.meta
To print the plot on a Postscript printer, you would do something like
plot -T ps < test.meta | lpr
To edit it with the free idraw drawing editor, you would do
plot -T ps < test.meta > test.ps
idraw test.ps
To produce a PNG file, you would do
plot -T png < test.meta > test.png
To produce a “portable anymap” (a file in PBM, PGM, or PPM format, whichever is most
appropriate) you would do
plot -T pnm < test.meta > test.pnm
and to produce a pseudo-GIF file, you would do
plot -T gif < test.meta > test.gif
Similarly, to produce versions of the plot in SVG format and WebCGM format that can be
displayed in a Web browser with SVG and WebCGM support, you would do
Chapter 3: The plot Program 31

plot -T svg < test.meta > test.svg

plot -T cgm < test.meta > test.cgm
To produce a version of the plot that can be viewed and edited with Adobe Illustrator, you
would do
plot -T ai < test.meta > test.ai
and to produce a version that can be viewed and edited with the free xfig drawing editor,
you would do
plot -T fig < test.meta > test.fig
xfig test.fig
Other formats may be obtained by using plot -T pcl, plot -T hpgl, plot -T regis, and
plot -T tek.
plot may behave differently depending on the environment in which it is invoked. In par-
ticular, plot -T svg, plot -T ai, plot -T ps, plot -T cgm, plot -T fig, plot -T pcl, and
plot -T hpgl are affected by the environment variable PAGESIZE. plot -T X, plot -T png,
plot -T pnm, and plot -T gif are affected by the environment variable BITMAPSIZE. The
DISPLAY environment variable affects the operation of plot -T X, and the TERM environment
variable affects the operation of plot -T tek. There are also several environment variables
that affect the operation of plot -T pcl and plot -T hpgl. For a complete discussion of
the effects of the environment on plot, see Section 3.3 [plot Environment], page 36.

3.2 plot command-line options

The plot filter plot translates GNU graphics metafiles to other formats. The ‘-T’ option is
used to specify the output format. Files in metafile format are produced by GNU graph,
pic2plot, tek2plot, plotfont, and other applications that use the GNU libplot graphics
library. For technical details on the metafile format, see Appendix D [Metafiles], page 169.
Input file names may be specified anywhere on the command line. That is, the relative
order of file names and command-line options does not matter. If no files are specified,
or the file name ‘-’ is specified, the standard input is read. An output file is written to
standard output, unless the ‘-T X’ option is specified. In that case the output is displayed
in a window or windows on an X Window System display, and there is no output file.
The full set of command-line options is listed below. There are four sorts of option:
1. Options setting the values of drawing parameters.
2. Options relevant only to raw plot, i.e., relevant only if no output format is specified
with the ‘-T’ option.
3. Options specifying the type of metafile format the input is in (for backward compati-
bility only).
4. Options requesting information (e.g., ‘--help’).
Each option that takes an argument is followed, in parentheses, by the type and default
value of the argument.
The following options set the values of drawing parameters.
‘-T type’
‘--output-format type’
(String, default "meta".) Select an output format of type type, which may
be one of the strings "X", "png", "pnm", "gif", "svg", "ai", "ps", "cgm",
Chapter 3: The plot Program 32

"fig", "pcl", "hpgl", "regis", "tek", and "meta". These refer respectively to
the X Window System, PNG format, portable anymap (PBM/PGM/PPM) for-
mat, pseudo-GIF format, the XML-based Scalable Vector Graphics format, the
format used by Adobe Illustrator, idraw-editable Postscript, the WebCGM for-
mat for Web-based vector graphics, the format used by the xfig drawing editor,
the Hewlett–Packard PCL 5 printer language, the Hewlett–Packard Graphics
Language (by default, HP-GL/2), the ReGIS (remote graphics instruction set)
format developed by DEC, Tektronix format, and device-independent GNU
graphics metafile format. The option ‘--display-type’ is an obsolete alterna-
tive to ‘--output-format’.
‘-p n’
‘--page-number n’
(Positive integer.) Display only page number n, within the metafile or sequence
of metafiles that is being translated.
Metafiles may consist of one or more pages, numbered beginning with 1. Also,
each page may contain multiple ‘frames’. plot -T X, plot -T regis, or plot -T
tek, which plot in real time, will separate successive frames by screen erasures.
plot -T png, plot -T pnm, plot -T gif, plot -T svg, plot -T ai, plot -T ps,
plot -T cgm, plot -T fig, plot -T pcl, plot -T hpgl, which do not plot in
real time, will display only the last frame of any multi-frame page.
The default behavior, if ‘-p’ is not used, is to display all pages. For example,
plot -T X displays each page in its own X window. If the ‘-T png’ option, the
‘-T pnm’ option, the ‘-T gif’ option, the ‘-T svg’ option, the ‘-T ai’ option, or
the ‘-T fig’ option is used, the default behavior is to display only the first page,
since files in PNG, PNM, pseudo-GIF, SVG, AI, or Fig format may contain only
a single page of graphics.
Most metafiles produced by the GNU plotting utilities (e.g., by raw graph)
contain only a single page, consisting of two frames: an empty one to clear the
display, and a second one containing graphics.
‘-s’
‘--merge-pages’
Merge all displayed pages into a single page, and also merge all ‘frames’ within
each displayed page.
This option is useful when merging together single-page plots from different
sources. For example, it can be used to merge together plots obtained from
separate invocations of graph. This is an alternative form of multiplotting (see
Section 2.4 [Multiplotting], page 12).
‘--bitmap-size bitmap_size’
(String, default "570x570".) Set the size of the graphics display in which the
plot will be drawn, in terms of pixels, to be bitmap size. This is relevant only
to plot -T X, plot -T png, plot -T pnm, and plot -T gif, for all of which the
size can be expressed in terms of pixels. The environment variable BITMAPSIZE
may equally well be used to specify the size.
The graphics display used by plot -T X is a popped-up X window.
Command-line positioning of this window on an X Window System display is
Chapter 3: The plot Program 33

supported. For example, if bitmap size is "570x570+0+0" then the window

will be popped up in the upper left corner.
If you choose a rectangular (non-square) window size, the fonts in the plot will
be scaled anisotropically, i.e., by different factors in the horizontal and vertical
direction. Any font that cannot be anisotropically scaled will be replaced by a
default scalable font, such as the Hershey vector font "HersheySerif".
For backward compatibility, plot -T X allows the user to set the window
size and position by setting the X resource Xplot.geometry, instead of
‘--bitmap-size’ or BITMAPSIZE.
‘--emulate-color option’
(String, default "no".) If option is "yes", replace each color in the output by
an appropriate shade of gray. This is seldom useful, except when using ‘plot
-T pcl’ to prepare output for a PCL 5 device. (Many monochrome PCL 5
devices, such as monochrome LaserJets, do a poor job of emulating color on
their own. They usually map HP-GL/2’s seven standard pen colors, including
even yellow, to black.) You may equally well request color emulation by setting
the environment variable EMULATE_COLOR to "yes".
‘--max-line-length max_line_length’
(Integer, default 500.) Set the maximum number of points that a polygonal line
may contain, before it is flushed to the output device, to equal max line length.
If this flushing occurs, the polygonal line will be split into two or more sub-lines,
though the splitting should not be noticeable. Splitting will not take place if
the line is the boundary of a filled polygon.
The reason for splitting long polygonal lines is that some display devices (e.g.,
old Postscript printers and HP-GL pen plotters) have limited buffer sizes. The
environment variable MAX_LINE_LENGTH can also be used to specify the maxi-
mum line length. This option has no effect on plot -T tek or raw plot, since
they draw polylines in real time and have no buffer limitations.
‘--page-size pagesize’
(String, default "letter".) Set the size of the page on which the plot will be
positioned. This is relevant only to plot -T svg, plot -T ai, plot -T ps, plot
-T cgm, plot -T fig, plot -T pcl, and plot -T hpgl. "letter" means an 8.5 in
by 11 in page. Any ISO page size in the range "a0". . . "a4" or ANSI page size in
the range "a". . . "e" may be specified ("letter" is an alias for "a" and "tabloid"
is an alias for "b"). "legal", "ledger", and "b5" are recognized page sizes also.
The environment variable PAGESIZE can equally well be used to specify the page
size.
For plot -T ai, plot -T ps, plot -T pcl, and plot -T fig, the graphics dis-
play (or ‘viewport’) within which the plot is drawn will be, by default, a square
region centered on the specified page. For plot -T hpgl, it will be a square
region of the same size, but may be positioned differently. Either or both of the
dimensions of the graphics display can be specified explicitly. For example, pa-
gesize could be specified as "letter,xsize=4in", or "a4,xsize=10cm,ysize=15cm".
The dimensions are allowed to be negative (a negative dimension results in a
reflection).
Chapter 3: The plot Program 34

The position of the graphics display, relative to its default position, may option-
ally be adjusted by specifying an offset vector. For example, pagesize could be
specified as "letter,yoffset=1.2in", or "a4,xoffset=−5mm,yoffset=2.0cm". It is
also possible to position the graphics display precisely, by specifying the loca-
tion of its lower left corner relative to the lower left corner of the page. For
example, pagesize could be specified as "letter,xorigin=2in,yorigin=3in", or
"a4,xorigin=0.5cm,yorigin=0.5cm". The preceding options may be intermin-
gled.
plot -T svg and plot -T cgm ignore the "xoffset", "yoffset", "xorigin", and
"yorigin" options, since SVG format and WebCGM format have no notion
of the Web page on which the graphics display will ultimately be positioned.
However, they do respect the "xsize" and "ysize" options. For more on page
sizes, see Appendix C [Page and Viewport Sizes], page 167.
The following options set the initial values of additional drawing parameters. Any of
these may be overridden by a directive in the metafile itself. In fact, these options are useful
only when plotting old metafiles in the pre-GNU ‘plot(5)’ format, which did not include
such directives.
‘--bg-color name’
(String, default "white".) Set the color used for the plot background to be
name. This is relevant only to plot -T X, plot -T png, plot -T pnm, plot -T
gif, plot -T cgm, plot -T regis, and plot -Tmeta. An unrecognized name
sets the color to the default. For information on what names are recognized,
see Appendix B [Color Names], page 166. The environment variable BG_COLOR
can equally well be used to specify the background color.
If the ‘-T png’ or ‘-T gif’ option is used, a transparent PNG file or a transparent
pseudo-GIF, respectively, may be produced by setting the TRANSPARENT_COLOR
environment variable to the name of the background color. See Section 3.3 [plot
Environment], page 36. If the ‘-T svg’ or ‘-T cgm’ option is used, an output
file without a background may be produced by setting the background color to
"none".
‘-f font_size’
‘--font-size font_size’
(Float, initial value device-dependent.) Set the initial size of the font used for
rendering text, as a fraction of the width of the graphics display, to font size.
‘-F font_name’
‘--font-name font_name’
(String, default "Helvetica" except for plot -T pcl, for which "Univers" is
the default, and plot -T png, plot -T pnm, plot -T gif, plot -T hpgl, plot
-T regis, plot -T tek, and raw plot, for all of which "HersheySerif" is the
default.) Set the font initially used for text (i.e., for ‘labels’) to font name. Font
names are case-insensitive. If the specified font is not available, the default font
will be used. Which fonts are available depends on which ‘-T’ option is used. For
a list of all fonts, see Section A.1 [Text Fonts], page 144. The plotfont utility
will produce a character map of any available font. See Chapter 6 [plotfont],
page 56.
Chapter 3: The plot Program 35

‘-W line_width’
‘--line-width line_width’
(Float, default −1.0.) Set the thickness of lines, as a fraction of the size (i.e.,
minimum dimension) of the graphics display, to line width. A negative value
means that the default value provided by the GNU libplot graphics library
should be used. This is usually 1/850 times the size of the display, although if
‘-T X’, ‘-T png’, ‘-T pnm’, or ‘-T gif’ is specified, it is zero. By convention, a
zero-thickness line is the thinnest line that can be drawn. This is the case in
all output formats. Note, however, that the drawing editors idraw and xfig
treat zero-thickness lines as invisible.
plot -T tek and plot -T regis do not support drawing lines with other than
a default thickness, and plot -T hpgl does not support doing so if the environ-
ment variable HPGL_VERSION is set to a value less than "2" (the default).

‘--pen-color name’
(String, default "black".) Set the pen color to be name. An unrecognized name
sets the pen color to the default. For information on what color names are
recognized, see Appendix B [Color Names], page 166.

The following option is relevant only to raw plot, i.e., relevant only if no output type is
specified with the ‘-T’ option. In this case plot outputs a graphics metafile, which may be
translated to other formats by a second invocation of plot.

‘-O’
‘--portable-output’
Output the portable (human-readable) version of GNU metafile format, rather
than a binary version (the default). This can also be requested by setting the
environment variable META_PORTABLE to "yes".

plot will automatically determine which type of GNU metafile format the input is in.
There are two types: binary (the default) and portable (human-readable). The binary
format is machine-dependent. See Appendix D [Metafiles], page 169.
For compatibility with older plotting software, the reading of input files in the pre-GNU
‘plot(5)’ format is also supported. This is normally a binary format, with each integer
in the metafile represented as a pair of bytes. The order of the two bytes is machine
dependent. You may specify that input file(s) are in plot(5) format rather than ordinary
GNU metafile format by using either the ‘-h’ option (“high byte first”) or the ‘-l’ option
(“low byte first”), whichever is appropriate. Some non-GNU systems support an ASCII
(human-readable) variant of plot(5) format. You may specify that the input is in this
format by using the ‘-A’ option. Irrespective of the variant, a file in plot(5) format includes
only one page of graphics.

‘-h’
‘--high-byte-first-input’
Input file(s) are assumed to be in traditional ‘plot(5)’ metafile format, with the
high-order byte of each integer occurring first. This variant is uncommon.
Chapter 3: The plot Program 36

‘-l’
‘--low-byte-first-input’
Input file(s) are assumed to be in traditional ‘plot(5)’ metafile format, with the
low-order byte of each integer occurring first. This variant is the most common.
‘-A’
‘--ascii-input’
Input file(s) are assumed to be in the ASCII variant of traditional ‘plot(5)’
metafile format. This variant is rare: on some older systems, it is produced by
a program called plottoa.
The following options request information.
‘--help’ Print a list of command-line options, and then exit.
‘--help-fonts’
Print a table of available fonts, and then exit. The table will depend on which
output format is specified with the ‘-T’ option. plot -T X, plot -T svg, plot
-T ai, plot -T ps, plot -T cgm, and plot -T fig each support the 35 stan-
dard Postscript fonts. plot -T svg, plot -T ai, plot -T pcl, and plot -T
hpgl support the 45 standard PCL 5 fonts, and plot -T pcl and plot -T hpgl
support a number of Hewlett–Packard vector fonts. All of the preceding, to-
gether with plot -T png, plot -T pnm, plot -T gif, plot -T regis, and plot
-T tek, support a set of 22 Hershey vector fonts. Raw plot in principle sup-
ports any of these fonts, since its output must be translated to other formats
with plot. The plotfont utility will produce a character map of any available
font. See Chapter 6 [plotfont], page 56.
‘--list-fonts’
Like ‘--help-fonts’, but lists the fonts in a single column to facilitate piping
to other programs. If no output format is specified with the ‘-T’ option, the
full set of supported fonts is listed.
‘--version’
Print the version number of plot and the plotting utilities package, and exit.

3.3 Environment variables

The behavior of plot is affected by several environment variables. We have
already mentioned the environment variables BITMAPSIZE, PAGESIZE, BG_COLOR,
EMULATE_COLOR, MAX_LINE_LENGTH, and ROTATION. They serve as backups for the
several options ‘--bitmap-size’, ‘--page-size’, ‘--bg-color’, ‘--emulate-color’,
‘--max-line-length’, and ‘--rotation’. The remaining environment variables are
specific to individual output formats.
plot -T X, which pops up a window on an X Window System display and draws graphics
in it, checks the DISPLAY environment variable. The value of this variable determines the
display on which the window will be popped up.
plot -T png and plot -T gif, which produce output in PNG format and pseudo-GIF
format respectively, are affected by two environment variables. If the value of the INTERLACE
variable is "yes", the output file will be interlaced. Also, if the value of the TRANSPARENT_
COLOR environment variable is the name of a color that appears in the output file, that color
Chapter 3: The plot Program 37

will be treated as transparent by most applications. For information on what color names
are recognized, see Appendix B [Color Names], page 166.
plot -T pnm, which produces output in Portable Anymap (PBM/PGM/PPM) format,
is affected by the PNM_PORTABLE environment variable. If its value is "yes", the output file
will be in the portable (human readable) version of PBM, PGM, or PPM format, rather
than the default (binary) version.
plot -T cgm, which produces CGM files that comply with the WebCGM profile for Web-
based vector graphics, is affected by two environment variables. By default, a version 3
CGM file is generated. Many older CGM interpreters and viewers, such as the ones built
into Microsoft Office and other commercial software, only support version 1 CGM files. The
CGM_MAX_VERSION environment variable may be set to "1", "2", "3", or "4" (the default) to
specify a maximum value for the version number. The CGM_ENCODING variable may also be
set, to specify the type of encoding used in the CGM file. Supported values are "clear text"
(i.e., human readable) and "binary" (the default). The WebCGM profile requires that the
binary encoding be used.
plot -T pcl, which produces PCL 5 output for Hewlett–Packard printers, is affected by
the environment variable PCL_ASSIGN_COLORS. It should be set to "yes" when producing
PCL 5 output for a color printer or other color device. This will ensure accurate color
reproduction by giving the output device complete freedom in assigning colors, internally,
to its “logical pens”. If it is "no" then the device will use a fixed set of colored pens, and will
emulate other colors by shading. The default is "no" because monochrome PCL 5 devices,
which are more common than colored ones, must use shading to emulate color.
plot -T hpgl, which produces Hewlett–Packard Graphics Language output, is also af-
fected by several environment variables. The most important is HPGL_VERSION, which may
be set to "1", "1.5", or "2" (the default). "1" means that the output should be generic HP-
GL, "1.5" means that the output should be suitable for the HP7550A graphics plotter and
the HP758x, HP7595A and HP7596A drafting plotters (HP-GL with some HP-GL/2 exten-
sions), and "2" means that the output should be modern HP-GL/2. If the version is "1"
or "1.5" then the only available fonts will be vector fonts, and all lines will be drawn with
a default thickness (the ‘-W’ option will not work). Additionally, if the version is "1" then
the filling of arbitrary curves with solid color will not be supported (circles and rectangles
aligned with the coordinate axes may be filled, though).
The position of the plot -T hpgl graphics display on the page can be rotated 90 degrees
counterclockwise by setting the HPGL_ROTATE environment variable to "yes". This is not
the same as the rotation obtained with the ‘--rotation’ option, since it both rotates the
graphics display and repositions its lower left corner toward another corner of the page.
Besides "no" and "yes", recognized values for the HPGL_ROTATE variable are "0", "90",
"180", and "270". "no" and "yes" are equivalent to "0" and "90", respectively. "180" and
"270" are supported only if HPGL_VERSION is "2" (the default).
Opaque filling and the drawing of visible white lines are supported only if HPGL_VERSION
is "2" (the default) and the environment variable HPGL_OPAQUE_MODE is "yes" (the default).
If the value is "no" then opaque filling will not be used, and white lines (if any), which
are normally drawn with pen #0, will not be drawn. This feature is to accommodate older
HP-GL/2 devices. HP-GL/2 pen plotters, for example, do not support opacity or the use
of pen #0 to draw visible white lines. Some older HP-GL/2 devices reportedly malfunction
if asked to draw opaque objects.
Chapter 3: The plot Program 38

By default, plot -T hpgl will draw with a fixed set of pens. Which pens are present may
be specified by setting the HPGL_PENS environment variable. If HPGL_VERSION is "1", the
default value of HPGL_PENS is "1=black"; if HPGL_VERSION is "1.5" or "2", the default value
of HPGL_PENS is "1=black:2=red:3=green:4=yellow:5=blue:6=magenta:7=cyan". The for-
mat should be self-explanatory. By setting HPGL_PENS, you may specify a color for any
pen in the range #1. . . #31. For information on what color names are recognized, see
Appendix B [Color Names], page 166. Pen #1 must always be present, though it need not
be black. Any pen in the range #2. . . #31 may be omitted.
If HPGL_VERSION is "2" then plot -T hpgl will also be affected by the environment
variable HPGL_ASSIGN_COLORS. If the value of this variable is "yes", then plot -T hpgl
will not be restricted to the palette specified in HPGL_PENS: it will assign colors to “logical
pens” in the range #1. . . #31, as needed. The default value is "no" because other than color
LaserJet printers and DesignJet plotters, not many HP-GL/2 devices allow the assignment
of colors to logical pens. In particular, HP-GL/2 pen plotters do not.
plot -T tek, which produces output for a Tektronix terminal or emulator, checks the
TERM environment variable. If the value of TERM is a string beginning with "xterm", "nx-
term", or "kterm", it is taken as a sign that plot is running in an X Window System VT100
terminal emulator: an xterm, nxterm, or kterm. Before drawing graphics, plot -T tek will
emit an escape sequence that causes the terminal emulator’s auxiliary Tektronix window,
which is normally hidden, to pop up. After the graphics are drawn, an escape sequence
that returns control to the original VT100 window will be emitted. The Tektronix window
will remain on the screen.
If the value of TERM is a string beginning with "kermit", "ansi.sys", or "nansi.sys", it is
taken as a sign that plot is running in the VT100 terminal emulator provided by the MS-
DOS version of kermit. Before drawing graphics, plot -T tek will emit an escape sequence
that switches the terminal emulator to Tektronix mode. Also, some of the Tektronix control
codes emitted by plot -T tek will be kermit-specific. There will be a limited amount of
color support, which is not normally the case (the 16 ansi.sys colors will be supported).
After drawing graphics, plot -T tek will emit an escape sequence that returns the emulator
to VT100 mode. The key sequence ‘ALT minus’ can be employed manually within kermit
to switch between the two modes.
Chapter 4: The pic2plot Program 39

4 The pic2plot Program

4.1 What pic2plot is used for

The pic2plot program takes one or more files in the pic language, and either displays
the figures that they contain on an X Window System display, or produces an output file
containing the figures. Many graphics file formats are supported.
The pic language is a ‘little language’ that was developed at Bell Laboratories for cre-
ating box-and-arrow diagrams of the kind frequently found in technical papers and text-
books. A directory containing documentation on the pic language is distributed along
with the plotting utilities. On most systems it is installed as ‘/usr/share/pic2plot’ or
‘/usr/local/share/pic2plot’. The directory includes Brian Kernighan’s original techni-
cal report on the language, Eric S. Raymond’s tutorial on the GNU implementation, and
some sample pic macros contributed by the late W. Richard Stevens.
The pic language was originally designed to work with the troff document formatter.
In that context it is read by a translator called pic, or its GNU counterpart gpic. Since
extensive documentation on pic and gpic is available, this section simply gives an example
of an input file, and mentions some extra features supported by pic2plot.
A pic file contains one or more figures, each of the box-and-arrow type. Each figure is
begun by a line reading .PS, and ended by a line reading .PE. Lines that are not contained
in a .PS. . . .PE pair are ignored. Each figure is built from geometrical objects, such as
rectangular boxes, circles, ellipses, quarter circles (“arcs”), polygonal lines, and splines.
Arcs, polygonal lines, and spline may be equipped with arrowheads. Any object may be
labeled with one or more lines of text.
Objects are usually positioned not by specifying their positions in absolute coordinates,
but rather by specifying their positions relative to other, previously drawn objects. The
following figure is an example.
.PS
box "START"; arrow; circle dashed filled; arrow
circle diam 2 thickness 3 "This is a" "big, thick" "circle" dashed; up
arrow from top of last circle; ellipse "loopback" dashed
arrow dotted from left of last ellipse to top of last box
arc cw radius 1/2 from top of last ellipse; arrow
box "END"
.PE
If you put this example in a file and run ‘pic2plot -T X’ on the file, a window containing
the figure will be popped up on your X display. Similarly, if you run ‘pic2plot -T ps’ on
the file, a Postscript file containing the figure will be written to standard output. The
Postscript file may be edited with the idraw drawing editor. Other graphics formats such
as PNG format, PNM format, pseudo-GIF format, SVG format, WebCGM format, or Fig
format (which is editable with the xfig drawing editor) may be obtained similarly. You
would use the options ‘-T png’, ‘-T pnm’, ‘-T gif’, samp -T svg, ‘-T cgm’, and ‘-T fig’,
respectively.
The above example illustrates some of the features of the pic language. By default,
successive objects are drawn so as to touch each other. The drawing proceeds in a certain
Chapter 4: The pic2plot Program 40

direction, which at startup is left-to-right. The ‘up’ command changes this direction to
bottom-to-top, so that the next object (the arrow extending from the top of the big circle)
will point upward rather than to the right.
Objects have sizes and other attributes, which may be set globally, or specified on a
per-object basis. For example, the diameter of a circle may be specified, or the radius of
an arc. An arc may be oriented clockwise rather than counterclockwise by specifying the
‘cw’ attribute. The line style of most objects may be altered by specifying the ‘dashed’ or
‘dotted’ attribute. Also, any object may be labeled, by specifying one or more text strings
as attributes. A text string may contain escape sequences that shift the font, append
subscripts or superscripts, or include non-ASCII characters and mathematical symbols. See
Section A.4 [Text String Format], page 151.
Most sizes and positions are expressed in terms of ‘virtual inches’. The use of virtual
inches is peculiar to pic2plot. The graphics display used by pic2plot, i.e., its drawing
region, is defined to be a square, 8 virtual inches wide and 8 virtual inches high. If the page
size for the output file is the "letter" size, which is the default for Postscript output, virtual
inches will the same as real inches. But a different page size may be specified; for example,
by using the ‘--page-size a4’ option. If so, a virtual inch will simply equal one-eighth of
the width of the graphics display. On A4 paper, the graphics display is a square of size
19.81 cm.
By default, each figure is centered in the graphics display. You may turn off centering,
so that you can use absolute coordinates, by using the ‘-n’ option. For example, a figure
consisting only of the object ‘arrow from (8,8) to (4,4)’ will be positioned in the absence
of centering so that the head of the arrow is at the center of the display. Its tail will be at
the upper right corner.
The thickness of lines is not specified in terms of virtual inches. For compatibility with
gpic, it is specified in terms of virtual points. The example above, which specifies the
‘thickness’ attribute of one of the objects, illustrates this. There are 72 virtual points per
virtual inch.
If there is more than one figure to be displayed, they will appear in different X windows,
or on successive pages of the output file. Some output formats (such as PNG, PNM, pseudo-
GIF, SVG, Illustrator, and Fig) support only a single page of graphics. If any of those output
formats is chosen, only the first figure will appear in the output file. Currently, pic2plot
cannot produce animated pseudo-GIFs.
The preceding survey does not do justice to the pic language, which is actually a full-
featured programming language, with support for variables, looping constructs, etc. Its
advanced features make the drawing of large, repetitive diagrams quite easy.

4.2 pic2plot command-line options

The pic2plot program translates files in the pic language, which is used for creating box-
and-arrow diagrams of the kind frequently found in technical papers and textbooks, to other
graphics formats. The output format is specified with the ‘-T’ option. The possible output
formats are the same formats that are supported by the GNU graph and plot programs.
Input file names may be specified anywhere on the command line. That is, the relative
order of file names and command-line options does not matter. If no files are specified,
or the file name ‘-’ is specified, the standard input is read. An output file is written to
Chapter 4: The pic2plot Program 41

standard output, unless the ‘-T X’ option is specified. In that case the output is displayed
in one or more windows on an X Window System display, and there is no output file.
The full set of command-line options is listed below. There are three sorts of option:
1. General options.
2. Options relevant only to raw pic2plot, i.e., relevant only if no output format is specified
with the ‘-T’ option.
3. Options requesting information (e.g., ‘--help’).
Each option that takes an argument is followed, in parentheses, by the type and default
value of the argument.
The following are general options.
‘-T type’
‘--output-format type’
(String, default "meta".) Select an output format of type type, which may
be one of the strings "X", "png", "pnm", "gif", "svg", "ai", "ps", "cgm",
"fig", "pcl", "hpgl", "regis", "tek", and "meta". These refer respectively to
the X Window System, PNG format, portable anymap (PBM/PGM/PPM) for-
mat, pseudo-GIF format, the XML-based Scalable Vector Graphics format, the
format used by Adobe Illustrator, idraw-editable Postscript, the WebCGM for-
mat for Web-based vector graphics, the format used by the xfig drawing editor,
the Hewlett–Packard PCL 5 printer language, the Hewlett–Packard Graphics
Language (by default, HP-GL/2), the ReGIS (remote graphics instruction set)
format developed by DEC, Tektronix format, and device-independent GNU
graphics metafile format. The option ‘--display-type’ is an obsolete alterna-
tive to ‘--output-format’.
‘-d’
‘--precision-dashing’
Draw dashed and dotted lines carefully, i.e., draw each dash and dot as a
separately positioned object. The default is to use the support for dashed and
dotted lines provided by the underlying graphics library, GNU libplot.
This option may produce slightly better-looking dashed and dotted lines. How-
ever, it will come at a price: if an editable output file is produced (i.e., an output
file in Illustrator, Postscript or Fig format), it will be difficulty to modify its
dashed and dotted lines with a drawing editor.
‘-f font_size’
‘--font-size font_size’
(Float, default 0.0175.) Set the size of the font used for rendering text, as a
fraction of the width of the graphics display, to font size.
‘-F font_name’
‘--font-name font_name’
(String, default "Helvetica" except for pic2plot -T pcl, for which "Univers"
is the default, and pic2plot -T png, pic2plot -T pnm, pic2plot -T gif,
pic2plot -T hpgl, pic2plot -T regis, pic2plot -T tek, and raw pic2plot,
for all of which "HersheySerif" is the default.) Set the font used for text
Chapter 4: The pic2plot Program 42

to font name. Font names are case-insensitive. If the specified font is not
available, the default font will be used. Which fonts are available depends on
which ‘-T’ option is used. For a list of all fonts, see Section A.1 [Text Fonts],
page 144. The plotfont utility will produce a character map of any available
font. See Chapter 6 [plotfont], page 56.
‘-n’
‘--no-centering’
Turn off the automatic centering of each figure. If this option is specified, the
position of the objects in each figure may be specified in terms of absolute
coordinates. E.g., ‘line from (0,0) to (4,4)’ will draw a line segment from
the lower left corner to the center of the graphics display, since the display
width and display height are defined to equal 8 virtual inches.
‘-W line_width’
‘--line-width line_width’
(Float, default −1.0.) Set the default thickness of lines, as a fraction of the size
(i.e., minimum dimension) of the graphics display, to line width. A negative
value means that the default value provided by the GNU libplot graphics
library should be used. This is usually 1/850 times the size of the display,
although if ‘-T X’, ‘-T png’, ‘-T pnm’, or ‘-T gif’ is specified, it is zero. By
convention, a zero-thickness line is the thinnest line that can be drawn. This is
the case in all output formats. Note, however, that the drawing editors idraw
and xfig treat zero-thickness lines as invisible.
pic2plot -T hpgl does not support drawing lines with other than a default
thickness if the environment variable HPGL_VERSION is set to a value less
than "2" (the default).
‘--bg-color name’
(String, default "white".) Set the color used for the background to be name.
This is relevant only to pic2plot -T X, pic2plot -T png, pic2plot -T pnm,
pic2plot -T gif, pic2plot -T cgm, pic2plot -T regis, and pic2plot -T
meta. An unrecognized name sets the color to the default. For information
on what names are recognized, see Appendix B [Color Names], page 166.
The environment variable BG_COLOR can equally well be used to specify the
background color.
If the ‘-T png’ or ‘-T gif’ option is used, a transparent PNG file or a transparent
pseudo-GIF, respectively, may be produced by setting the TRANSPARENT_COLOR
environment variable to the name of the background color. See Section 4.3
[pic2plot Environment], page 45. If the ‘-T svg’ or ‘-T cgm’ option is used, an
output file without a background may be produced by setting the background
color to "none".
‘--bitmap-size bitmap_size’
(String, default "570x570".) Set the size of the graphics display in which the
plot will be drawn, in terms of pixels, to be bitmap size. This is relevant only
to pic2plot -T X, pic2plot -T png, pic2plot -T pnm, and pic2plot -T gif,
for all of which the size can be expressed in terms of pixels. The environment
variable BITMAPSIZE may equally well be used to specify the size.
Chapter 4: The pic2plot Program 43

The graphics display used by pic2plot -T X is a popped-up X window.

Command-line positioning of this window on an X Window System display is
supported. For example, if bitmap size is "570x570+0+0" then the window
will be popped up in the upper left corner.
If you choose a rectangular (non-square) window size, the fonts in the plot will
be scaled anisotropically, i.e., by different factors in the horizontal and vertical
direction. Any font that cannot be anisotropically scaled will be replaced by a
default scalable font, such as the Hershey vector font "HersheySerif".
For backward compatibility, pic2plot -T X allows the user to set the win-
dow size and position by setting the X resource Xplot.geometry, instead of
‘--bitmap-size’ or BITMAPSIZE.
‘--emulate-color option’
(String, default "no".) If option is "yes", replace each color in the output by an
appropriate shade of gray. This is seldom useful, except when using ‘pic2plot
-T pcl’ to prepare output for a PCL 5 device. (Many monochrome PCL 5
devices, such as monochrome LaserJets, do a poor job of emulating color on
their own. They usually map HP-GL/2’s seven standard pen colors, including
even yellow, to black.) You may equally well request color emulation by setting
the environment variable EMULATE_COLOR to "yes".
‘--max-line-length max_line_length’
(Integer, default 500.) Set the maximum number of points that a polygonal line
may contain, before it is flushed to the output device, to equal max line length.
If this flushing occurs, the polygonal line will be split into two or more sub-lines,
though the splitting should not be noticeable.
The reason for splitting long polygonal lines is that some display devices (e.g.,
old Postscript printers and HP-GL pen plotters) have limited buffer sizes. The
environment variable MAX_LINE_LENGTH can also be used to specify the max-
imum line length. This option has no effect on raw pic2plot, since it draws
polylines in real time and has no buffer limitations.
‘--page-size pagesize’
(String, default "letter".) Set the size of the page on which the plot will be po-
sitioned. This is relevant only to pic2plot -T svg, pic2plot -T ai, pic2plot
-T ps, pic2plot -T cgm, pic2plot -T fig, pic2plot -T pcl, and pic2plot
-T hpgl. "letter" means an 8.5 in by 11 in page. Any ISO page size in the
range "a0". . . "a4" or ANSI page size in the range "a". . . "e" may be specified
("letter" is an alias for "a" and "tabloid" is an alias for "b"). "legal", "ledger",
and "b5" are recognized page sizes also. The environment variable PAGESIZE
can equally well be used to specify the page size.
For pic2plot -T ai, pic2plot -T ps, pic2plot -T pcl, and pic2plot -T fig,
the graphics display (or ‘viewport’) within which the plot is drawn will be,
by default, a square region centered on the specified page. For pic2plot -T
hpgl, it will be a square region of the same size, but may be positioned differ-
ently. Either or both of the dimensions of the graphics display can be speci-
fied explicitly. For example, pagesize could be specified as "letter,xsize=4in",
Chapter 4: The pic2plot Program 44

or "a4,xsize=10cm,ysize=15cm". The dimensions are allowed to be negative

(a negative dimension results in a reflection).
The position of the graphics display, relative to its default position, may option-
ally be adjusted by specifying an offset vector. For example, pagesize could be
specified as "letter,yoffset=1.2in", or "a4,xoffset=−5mm,yoffset=2.0cm". It is
also possible to position the graphics display precisely, by specifying the loca-
tion of its lower left corner relative to the lower left corner of the page. For
example, pagesize could be specified as "letter,xorigin=2in,yorigin=3in", or
"a4,xorigin=0.5cm,yorigin=0.5cm". The preceding options may be intermin-
gled.
pic2plot -T svg and pic2plot -T cgm ignore the "xoffset", "yoffset", "xori-
gin", and "yorigin" options, since SVG format and WebCGM format have no
notion of the Web page on which the graphics display will ultimately be posi-
tioned. However, they do respect the "xsize" and "ysize" options. For more on
page sizes, see Appendix C [Page and Viewport Sizes], page 167.
‘--pen-color name’
(String, default "black".) Set the pen color to be name. An unrecognized name
sets the pen color to the default. For information on what color names are
recognized, see Appendix B [Color Names], page 166.
‘--rotation angle’
(Float, default 0.0.) Set the rotation angle of the graphics display to be angle
degrees. The rotation is counterclockwise. The environment variable ROTATION
can equally well be used to specify the rotation angle.
This option is used for switching between portrait and landscape orientations,
which have rotation angles 0 and 90 degrees respectively. Postmodernists may
also find it useful.
The following option is relevant only to raw pic2plot, i.e., relevant only if no output
format is specified with the ‘-T’ option. In this case pic2plot outputs a graphics metafile,
which may be translated to other formats by invoking plot.
‘-O’
‘--portable-output’
Output the portable (human-readable) version of GNU metafile format, rather
than a binary version (the default). This can also be requested by setting the
environment variable META_PORTABLE to "yes".
The following options request information.
‘--help’ Print a list of command-line options, and then exit.
‘--help-fonts’
Print a table of available fonts, and then exit. The table will depend on which
output format is specified with the ‘-T’ option. pic2plot -T X, pic2plot
-T svg, pic2plot -T ai, pic2plot -T ps, pic2plot -T cgm, and pic2plot
-T fig each support the 35 standard Postscript fonts. pic2plot -T svg,
pic2plot -T ai, pic2plot -T pcl, and pic2plot -T hpgl support the 45
standard PCL 5 fonts, and pic2plot -T pcl and pic2plot -T hpgl support
Chapter 4: The pic2plot Program 45

a number of Hewlett–Packard vector fonts. All of the preceding, together

with pic2plot -T png, pic2plot -T pnm, pic2plot -T gif, pic2plot -T
regis, and pic2plot -T tek, support a set of 22 Hershey vector fonts. Raw
pic2plot in principle supports any of these fonts, since its output must be
translated to other formats with plot. The plotfont utility will produce a
character map of any available font. See Chapter 6 [plotfont], page 56.
‘--list-fonts’
Like ‘--help-fonts’, but lists the fonts in a single column to facilitate piping
to other programs. If no output format is specified with the ‘-T’ option, the
full set of supported fonts is listed.
‘--version’
Print the version number of pic2plot and the plotting utilities package, and
exit.

4.3 Environment variables

The behavior of pic2plot is affected by several environment variables. We have
already mentioned the environment variables BITMAPSIZE, PAGESIZE, BG_COLOR,
EMULATE_COLOR, MAX_LINE_LENGTH, and ROTATION. They serve as backups for the
several options ‘--bitmap-size’, ‘--page-size’, ‘--bg-color’, ‘--emulate-color’,
‘--max-line-length’, and ‘--rotation’. The remaining environment variables are
specific to individual output formats.
pic2plot -T X, which pops up a window on an X Window System display for each figure,
checks the DISPLAY environment variable. The value of this variable determines the display
on which the windows will be popped up.
pic2plot -T png and pic2plot -T gif, which produce output in PNG format and
pseudo-GIF format respectively, are affected by two environment variables. If the value
of the INTERLACE variable is "yes", the output file will be interlaced. Also, if the value of
the TRANSPARENT_COLOR environment variable is the name of a color that appears in the
output file, that color will be treated as transparent by most applications. For information
on what color names are recognized, see Appendix B [Color Names], page 166.
pic2plot -T pnm, which produces output in Portable Anymap (PBM/PGM/PPM) for-
mat, is affected by the PNM_PORTABLE environment variable. If its value is "yes", the output
file will be in the portable (human readable) version of PBM, PGM, or PPM format, rather
than the default (binary) version.
pic2plot -T cgm, which produces CGM files that comply with the WebCGM profile for
Web-based vector graphics, is affected by two environment variables. By default, a version 3
CGM file is generated. Many older CGM interpreters and viewers, such as the ones built
into Microsoft Office and other commercial software, only support version 1 CGM files. The
CGM_MAX_VERSION environment variable may be set to "1", "2", "3", or "4" (the default) to
specify a maximum value for the version number. The CGM_ENCODING variable may also be
set, to specify the type of encoding used in the CGM file. Supported values are "clear text"
(i.e., human readable) and "binary" (the default). The WebCGM profile requires that the
binary encoding be used.
pic2plot -T pcl, which produces PCL 5 output for Hewlett–Packard printers, is af-
fected by the environment variable PCL_ASSIGN_COLORS. It should be set to "yes" when
Chapter 4: The pic2plot Program 46

producing PCL 5 output for a color printer or other color device. This will ensure accurate
color reproduction by giving the output device complete freedom in assigning colors, inter-
nally, to its “logical pens”. If it is "no" then the device will use a fixed set of colored pens,
and will emulate other colors by shading. The default is "no" because monochrome PCL 5
devices, which are more common than colored ones, must use shading to emulate color.
pic2plot -T hpgl, which produces Hewlett–Packard Graphics Language output, is also
affected by several environment variables. The most important is HPGL_VERSION, which may
be set to "1", "1.5", or "2" (the default). "1" means that the output should be generic
HP-GL, "1.5" means that the output should be suitable for the HP7550A graphics plotter
and the HP758x, HP7595A and HP7596A drafting plotters (HP-GL with some HP-GL/2
extensions), and "2" means that the output should be modern HP-GL/2. If the version is
"1" or "1.5" then the only available fonts will be vector fonts, and all lines will be drawn with
a default thickness (the ‘-W’ option will not work). Additionally, if the version is "1" then
the filling of arbitrary curves with solid color will not be supported (circles and rectangles
aligned with the coordinate axes may be filled, though).
The position of the pic2plot -T hpgl graphics display on the page can be rotated
90 degrees counterclockwise by setting the HPGL_ROTATE environment variable to "yes".
This is not the same as the rotation obtained with the ‘--rotation’ option, since it both
rotates the graphics display and repositions its lower left corner toward another corner of
the page. Besides "no" and "yes", recognized values for the HPGL_ROTATE variable are
"0", "90", "180", and "270". "no" and "yes" are equivalent to "0" and "90", respectively.
"180" and "270" are supported only if HPGL_VERSION is "2" (the default).
Opaque filling and the drawing of visible white lines are supported only if HPGL_VERSION
is "2" (the default) and the environment variable HPGL_OPAQUE_MODE is "yes" (the default).
If the value is "no" then opaque filling will not be used, and white lines (if any), which
are normally drawn with pen #0, will not be drawn. This feature is to accommodate older
HP-GL/2 devices. HP-GL/2 pen plotters, for example, do not support opacity or the use
of pen #0 to draw visible white lines. Some older HP-GL/2 devices reportedly malfunction
if asked to draw opaque objects.
By default, pic2plot -T hpgl will draw with a fixed set of pens. Which pens are present
may be specified by setting the HPGL_PENS environment variable. If HPGL_VERSION is "1",
the default value of HPGL_PENS is "1=black"; if HPGL_VERSION is "1.5" or "2", the default
value of HPGL_PENS is "1=black:2=red:3=green:4=yellow:5=blue:6=magenta:7=cyan".
The format should be self-explanatory. By setting HPGL_PENS, you may specify a color for
any pen in the range #1. . . #31. For information on what color names are recognized, see
Appendix B [Color Names], page 166. Pen #1 must always be present, though it need not
be black. Any pen in the range #2. . . #31 may be omitted.
If HPGL_VERSION is "2" then pic2plot -T hpgl will also be affected by the environment
variable HPGL_ASSIGN_COLORS. If the value of this variable is "yes", then plot -T hpgl
will not be restricted to the palette specified in HPGL_PENS: it will assign colors to “logical
pens” in the range #1. . . #31, as needed. The default value is "no" because other than color
LaserJet printers and DesignJet plotters, not many HP-GL/2 devices allow the assignment
of colors to logical pens. In particular, HP-GL/2 pen plotters do not.
pic2plot -T tek, which produces output for a Tektronix terminal or emulator, checks
the TERM environment variable. If the value of TERM is a string beginning with "xterm",
Chapter 4: The pic2plot Program 47

"nxterm", or "kterm", it is taken as a sign that pic2plot is running in an X Window

System VT100 terminal emulator: an xterm, nxterm, or kterm. Before drawing graphics,
pic2plot -T tek will emit an escape sequence that causes the terminal emulator’s auxiliary
Tektronix window, which is normally hidden, to pop up. After the graphics are drawn, an
escape sequence that returns control to the original VT100 window will be emitted. The
Tektronix window will remain on the screen.
If the value of TERM is a string beginning with "kermit", "ansi.sys", or "nansi.sys", it is
taken as a sign that pic2plot is running in the VT100 terminal emulator provided by
the MS-DOS version of kermit. Before drawing graphics, pic2plot -T tek will emit an
escape sequence that switches the terminal emulator to Tektronix mode. Also, some of the
Tektronix control codes emitted by pic2plot -T tek will be kermit-specific. There will be
a limited amount of color support, which is not normally the case (the 16 ansi.sys colors
will be supported). After drawing graphics, pic2plot -T tek will emit an escape sequence
that returns the emulator to VT100 mode. The key sequence ‘ALT minus’ can be employed
manually within kermit to switch between the two modes.
Chapter 5: The tek2plot Program 48

5 The tek2plot Program

5.1 What tek2plot is used for

GNU tek2plot is a command-line Tektronix translator. It displays Tektronix graphics files,
or translates them to other formats. The ‘-T’ option is used to specify the output format.
Supported output formats include "X", "png", "pnm", "gif", "svg", "ai", "ps", "cgm",
"fig", "pcl", "hpgl", "regis", "tek", and "meta" (the default). These are the same formats
that are supported by the GNU graph, plot, and pic2plot programs. tek2plot will take
input from a file specified on the command line or from standard input, just as the plot
filter plot does.
Tektronix graphics files are produced by many older applications, such as SKYMAP,
a powerful astronomical display program. A directory containing sample Tektronix
graphics files, which you may experiment with, is distributed along with the GNU
plotting utilities. On most systems it is installed as ‘/usr/share/tek2plot’ or
‘/usr/local/share/tek2plot’.
Tektronix graphics format is defined as a noninteractive version of the graphics format
understood by Tektronix 4010/4014 terminals, as documented in the 4014 Service Manual,
Tektronix Inc., 1974 (Tektronix Part #070-1648-00). tek2plot does not support interactive
features such as graphics input mode (“GIN mode”) or status enquiry. However, it does
support a few additional features provided by popular Tektronix emulators, such as the
color extensions supported by the Tektronix emulator contained in the MS-DOS version of
kermit.

5.2 tek2plot command-line options

The tek2plot program translates the Tektronix graphics files produced by many older
applications to other formats. The output format is specified with the ‘-T’ option. The
possible output formats are the same formats that are supported by the GNU graph, plot,
and pic2plot programs.
Input file names may be specified anywhere on the command line. That is, the relative
order of file names and command-line options does not matter. If no files are specified,
or the file name ‘-’ is specified, the standard input is read. An output file is written to
standard output, unless the ‘-T X’ option is specified. In that case the output is displayed
in one or more windows on an X Window System display, and there is no output file.
The full set of command-line options is listed below. There are three sorts of option:
1. General options.
2. Options relevant only to raw tek2plot, i.e., relevant only if no output format is specified
with the ‘-T’ option.
3. Options requesting information (e.g., ‘--help’).
Each option that takes an argument is followed, in parentheses, by the type and default
value of the argument.
The following are general options.
Chapter 5: The tek2plot Program 49

‘-T type’
‘--output-format type’
(String, default "meta".) Select an output format of type type, which may
be one of the strings "X", "png", "pnm", "gif", "svg", "ai", "ps", "cgm",
"fig", "pcl", "hpgl", "regis", "tek", and "meta". These refer respectively to
the X Window System, PNG format, portable anymap (PBM/PGM/PPM) for-
mat, pseudo-GIF format, the XML-based Scalable Vector Graphics format, the
format used by Adobe Illustrator, idraw-editable Postscript, the WebCGM for-
mat for Web-based vector graphics, the format used by the xfig drawing editor,
the Hewlett–Packard PCL 5 printer language, the Hewlett–Packard Graphics
Language (by default, HP-GL/2), the ReGIS (remote graphics instruction set)
format developed by DEC, Tektronix format, and device-independent GNU
graphics metafile format.

‘-p n’
‘--page-number n’
(Nonnegative integer.) Display only page number n, within the Tektronix file or
sequence of Tektronix files that is being translated. Tektronix files may consist
of one or more pages, numbered beginning with zero.

The default behavior, if the ‘-p’ option is not used, is to display all nonempty
pages in succession. For example, tek2plot -T X displays each page in its own
X window. If the ‘-T png’ option, the ‘-T pnm’ option, the ‘-T gif’ option, the
‘-T svg’ option, the ‘-T ai’ option, or the ‘-T fig’ option is used, the default
behavior is to display only the first page, since files in PNG, PNM, pseudo-GIF,
SVG, AI, or Fig format may contain only a single page of graphics.

Most Tektronix files consist of either one page (page #0) or two pages (an empty
page #0, and page #1). Tektronix files produced by the GNU plotting utilities
(e.g., by graph -T tek) are normally of the latter sort.

‘-F font_name’
‘--font-name font_name’
(String, default "Courier" except for tek2plot -T png, tek2plot -T pnm,
tek2plot -T gif, tek2plot -T hpgl, tek2plot -T regis, and raw tek2plot,
for all of which "HersheySerif" is the default.) Set the font used for text to
font name. Font names are case-insensitive. If a font outside the Courier
family is chosen, the ‘--position-chars’ option (see below) should probably
be used. For a list of all fonts, see Section A.1 [Text Fonts], page 144. If the
specified font is not available, the default font will be used.

If you intend to print a PCL 5 file prepared with tek2plot -T pcl on a LaserJet
III, you should specify a font other than Courier. That is because the LaserJet
III, which was Hewlett–Packard’s first PCL 5 printer, did not come with a
scalable Courier typeface. The only PCL 5 fonts it supported were the eight
fonts in the CGTimes and Univers families. See Section A.1 [Text Fonts],
page 144.
Chapter 5: The tek2plot Program 50

‘-W line_width’
‘--line-width line_width’
(Float, default −1.0.) Set the thickness of lines, as a fraction of the size (i.e.,
minimum dimension) of the graphics display, to line width. A negative value
means that the default value provided by the GNU libplot graphics library
should be used. This is usually 1/850 times the size of the display, although if
‘-T X’, ‘-T png’, ‘-T pnm’, or ‘-T gif’ is specified, it is zero. By convention, a
zero-thickness line is the thinnest line that can be drawn. This is the case in
all output formats. Note, however, that the drawing editors idraw and xfig
treat zero-thickness lines as invisible.
tek2plot -T regis does not support drawing lines with other than a default
thickness, and tek2plot -T hpgl does not support doing so if the environment
variable HPGL_VERSION is set to a value less than "2" (the default).

‘--bg-color name’
(String, default "white".) Set the color used for the background to be name.
This is relevant only to tek2plot -T X, tek2plot -T png, tek2plot -T pnm,
tek2plot -T gif, tek2plot -T cgm, tek2plot -T regis, and tek2plot -T
meta. An unrecognized name sets the color to the default. For information
on what names are recognized, see Appendix B [Color Names], page 166.
The environment variable BG_COLOR can equally well be used to specify the
background color.
If the ‘-T png’ or ‘-T gif’ option is used, a transparent PNG file or a transparent
pseudo-GIF, respectively, may be produced by setting the TRANSPARENT_COLOR
environment variable to the name of the background color. See Section 5.3
[tek2plot Environment], page 53. If the ‘-T svg’ or ‘-T cgm’ option is used, an
output file without a background may be produced by setting the background
color to "none".

‘--bitmap-size bitmap_size’
(String, default "570x570".) Set the size of the graphics display in which the
plot will be drawn, in terms of pixels, to be bitmap size. This is relevant only
to tek2plot -T X, tek2plot -T png, tek2plot -T pnm, and tek2plot -T gif,
for all of which the size can be expressed in terms of pixels. The environment
variable BITMAPSIZE may equally well be used to specify the size.
The graphics display used by tek2plot -T X is a popped-up X window.
Command-line positioning of this window on an X Window System display is
supported. For example, if bitmap size is "570x570+0+0" then the window
will be popped up in the upper left corner.
If you choose a rectangular (non-square) window size, the fonts in the plot will
be scaled anisotropically, i.e., by different factors in the horizontal and vertical
direction. Any font that cannot be anisotropically scaled will be replaced by a
default scalable font, such as the Hershey vector font "HersheySerif".
For backward compatibility, tek2plot -T X allows the user to set the win-
dow size and position by setting the X resource Xplot.geometry, instead of
‘--bitmap-size’ or BITMAPSIZE.
Chapter 5: The tek2plot Program 51

‘--emulate-color option’
(String, default "no".) If option is "yes", replace each color in the output by an
appropriate shade of gray. This is seldom useful, except when using ‘tek2plot
-T pcl’ to prepare output for a PCL 5 device. (Many monochrome PCL 5
devices, such as monochrome LaserJets, do a poor job of emulating color on
their own. They usually map HP-GL/2’s seven standard pen colors, including
even yellow, to black.) You may equally well request color emulation by setting
the environment variable EMULATE_COLOR to "yes".
‘--max-line-length max_line_length’
(Integer, default 500.) Set the maximum number of points that a polygonal line
may contain, before it is flushed to the output device, to equal max line length.
If this flushing occurs, the polygonal line will be split into two or more sub-lines,
though the splitting should not be noticeable.
The reason for splitting long polygonal lines is that some display devices (e.g.,
old Postscript printers and HP-GL pen plotters) have limited buffer sizes. The
environment variable MAX_LINE_LENGTH can also be used to specify the max-
imum line length. This option has no effect on raw tek2plot, since it draws
polylines in real time and has no buffer limitations.
‘--page-size pagesize’
(String, default "letter".) Set the size of the page on which the plot will be po-
sitioned. This is relevant only to tek2plot -T svg, tek2plot -T ai, tek2plot
-T ps, tek2plot -T cgm, tek2plot -T fig, tek2plot -T pcl, and tek2plot
-T hpgl. "letter" means an 8.5 in by 11 in page. Any ISO page size in the
range "a0". . . "a4" or ANSI page size in the range "a". . . "e" may be specified
("letter" is an alias for "a" and "tabloid" is an alias for "b"). "legal", "ledger",
and "b5" are recognized page sizes also. The environment variable PAGESIZE
can equally well be used to specify the page size.
For tek2plot -T ai, tek2plot -T ps, tek2plot -T pcl, and tek2plot -T fig,
the graphics display (or ‘viewport’) within which the plot is drawn will be,
by default, a square region centered on the specified page. For tek2plot -T
hpgl, it will be a square region of the same size, but may be positioned differ-
ently. Either or both of the dimensions of the graphics display can be speci-
fied explicitly. For example, pagesize could be specified as "letter,xsize=4in",
or "a4,xsize=10cm,ysize=15cm". The dimensions are allowed to be negative
(a negative dimension results in a reflection).
The position of the graphics display, relative to its default position, may option-
ally be adjusted by specifying an offset vector. For example, pagesize could be
specified as "letter,yoffset=1.2in", or "a4,xoffset=−5mm,yoffset=2.0cm". It is
also possible to position the graphics display precisely, by specifying the loca-
tion of its lower left corner relative to the lower left corner of the page. For
example, pagesize could be specified as "letter,xorigin=2in,yorigin=3in", or
"a4,xorigin=0.5cm,yorigin=0.5cm". The preceding options may be intermin-
gled.
tek2plot -T svg and tek2plot -T cgm ignore the "xoffset", "yoffset", "xori-
gin", and "yorigin" options, since SVG format and WebCGM format have no
Chapter 5: The tek2plot Program 52

notion of the Web page on which the graphics display will ultimately be posi-
tioned. However, they do respect the "xsize" and "ysize" options. For more on
page sizes, see Appendix C [Page and Viewport Sizes], page 167.
‘--pen-color name’
(String, default "black".) Set the pen color to be name. An unrecognized name
sets the pen color to the default. For information on what color names are
recognized, see Appendix B [Color Names], page 166.
‘--position-chars’
Position the characters in each text string individually on the display. If the
text font is not a member of the Courier family, and especially if it is not a
fixed-width font, this option is recommended. It will improve the appearance
of text strings, at the price of making it difficult to edit the output file with
xfig or idraw.
‘--rotation angle’
(Float, default 0.0.) Set the rotation angle of the graphics display to be angle
degrees. The rotation is counterclockwise. The environment variable ROTATION
can equally well be used to specify the rotation angle.
This option is used for switching between portrait and landscape orientations,
which have rotation angles 0 and 90 degrees respectively. Postmodernists may
also find it useful.
‘--use-tek-fonts’
Use the fonts that were used on the original Tektronix 4010/4014 terminal,
to produce the most faithful rendition possible. This option is relevant
only to tek2plot -T X. Bitmap versions of the the four original Tektronix
fonts are distributed with the plotting utilities package, under the names
tekfont0. . . tekfont3. They may easily be installed on any modern
X Window System display. For this option to work properly, you must also
select a window size of 1024x1024 pixels, either by using the ‘--bitmap-size
1024x1024’ option or by setting the value of the Xplot.geometry resource.
The reason for this restriction is to prevent rescaling of the bitmap fonts.
This option is useful only if you have a file in Tektronix format that draws text
using native Tektronix fonts. Tektronix files produced by the GNU plotting
utilities (e.g., by graph -T tek) do not use native Tektronix fonts to draw text.
The following option is relevant only to raw tek2plot, i.e., relevant only if no output
format is specified with the ‘-T’ option. In this case tek2plot outputs a graphics metafile,
which may be translated to other formats by invoking plot.
‘-O’
‘--portable-output’
Output the portable (human-readable) version of GNU metafile format, rather
than a binary version (the default). This can also be requested by setting the
environment variable META_PORTABLE to "yes".
The following options request information.
‘--help’ Print a list of command-line options, and then exit.
Chapter 5: The tek2plot Program 53

‘--help-fonts’
Print a table of available fonts, and then exit. The table will depend on which
output format is specified with the ‘-T’ option. tek2plot -T X, tek2plot
-T svg, tek2plot -T ai, tek2plot -T ps, tek2plot -T cgm, and tek2plot
-T fig each support the 35 standard Postscript fonts. tek2plot -T svg,
tek2plot -T ai, tek2plot -T pcl, and tek2plot -T hpgl support the 45
standard PCL 5 fonts, and tek2plot -T pcl and tek2plot -T hpgl support
a number of Hewlett–Packard vector fonts. All of the preceding, together
with tek2plot -T png, tek2plot -T pnm, tek2plot -T gif, tek2plot -T
regis, and tek2plot -T tek, support a set of 22 Hershey vector fonts. Raw
tek2plot in principle supports any of these fonts, since its output must be
translated to other formats with plot. The plotfont utility will produce a
character map of any available font. See Chapter 6 [plotfont], page 56.
‘--list-fonts’
Like ‘--help-fonts’, but lists the fonts in a single column to facilitate piping
to other programs. If no output format is specified with the ‘-T’ option, the
full set of supported fonts is listed.
‘--version’
Print the version number of tek2plot and the plotting utilities package, and
exit.

5.3 Environment variables

The behavior of tek2plot is affected by several environment variables, which are the same
as those that affect graph and plot. For convenience, we list them here.
We have already mentioned the environment variables BITMAPSIZE, PAGESIZE, BG_
COLOR, EMULATE_COLOR, MAX_LINE_LENGTH, and ROTATION. They serve as backups for
the several options ‘--bitmap-size’, ‘--page-size’, ‘--bg-color’, ‘--emulate-color’,
‘--max-line-length’, and ‘--rotation’. The remaining environment variables are spe-
cific to individual output formats.
tek2plot -T X, which pops up a window on an X Window System display and draws
graphics in it, checks the DISPLAY environment variable. The value of this variable deter-
mines the display on which the window will be popped up.
tek2plot -T png and tek2plot -T gif, which produce output in PNG format and
pseudo-GIF format respectively, are affected by two environment variables. If the value
of the INTERLACE variable is "yes", the output file will be interlaced. Also, if the value of
the TRANSPARENT_COLOR environment variable is the name of a color that appears in the
output file, that color will be treated as transparent by most applications. For information
on what color names are recognized, see Appendix B [Color Names], page 166.
tek2plot -T pnm, which produces output in Portable Anymap (PBM/PGM/PPM) for-
mat, is affected by the PNM_PORTABLE environment variable. If its value is "yes", the output
file will be in the portable (human readable) version of PBM, PGM, or PPM format, rather
than the default (binary) version.
tek2plot -T cgm, which produces CGM files that comply with the WebCGM profile for
Web-based vector graphics, is affected by two environment variables. By default, a version 3
Chapter 5: The tek2plot Program 54

CGM file is generated. Many older CGM interpreters and viewers, such as the ones built
into Microsoft Office and other commercial software, only support version 1 CGM files. The
CGM_MAX_VERSION environment variable may be set to "1", "2", "3", or "4" (the default) to
specify a maximum value for the version number. The CGM_ENCODING variable may also be
set, to specify the type of encoding used in the CGM file. Supported values are "clear text"
(i.e., human readable) and "binary" (the default). The WebCGM profile requires that the
binary encoding be used.
tek2plot -T pcl, which produces PCL 5 output for Hewlett–Packard printers, is af-
fected by the environment variable PCL_ASSIGN_COLORS. It should be set to "yes" when
producing PCL 5 output for a color printer or other color device. This will ensure accurate
color reproduction by giving the output device complete freedom in assigning colors, inter-
nally, to its “logical pens”. If it is "no" then the device will use a fixed set of colored pens,
and will emulate other colors by shading. The default is "no" because monochrome PCL 5
devices, which are more common than colored ones, must use shading to emulate color.
tek2plot -T hpgl, which produces Hewlett–Packard Graphics Language output, is also
affected by several environment variables. The most important is HPGL_VERSION, which may
be set to "1", "1.5", or "2" (the default). "1" means that the output should be generic
HP-GL, "1.5" means that the output should be suitable for the HP7550A graphics plotter
and the HP758x, HP7595A and HP7596A drafting plotters (HP-GL with some HP-GL/2
extensions), and "2" means that the output should be modern HP-GL/2. If the version is
"1" or "1.5" then the only available fonts will be vector fonts, and all lines will be drawn
with a default thickness (the ‘-W’ option will not work).
The position of the tek2plot -T hpgl graphics display on the page can be rotated
90 degrees counterclockwise by setting the HPGL_ROTATE environment variable to "yes".
This is not the same as the rotation obtained with the ‘--rotation’ option, since it both
rotates the graphics display and repositions its lower left corner toward another corner of
the page. Besides "no" and "yes", recognized values for the HPGL_ROTATE variable are
"0", "90", "180", and "270". "no" and "yes" are equivalent to "0" and "90", respectively.
"180" and "270" are supported only if HPGL_VERSION is "2" (the default).
The drawing of visible white lines is supported only if HPGL_VERSION is "2" and the
environment variable HPGL_OPAQUE_MODE is "yes" (the default). If the value is "no" then
white lines (if any), which are normally drawn with pen #0, will not be drawn. This
feature is to accommodate older HP-GL/2 devices. HP-GL/2 pen plotters, for example, do
not support the use of pen #0 to draw visible white lines. Some older HP-GL/2 devices
may, in fact, malfunction if asked to draw opaque objects.
By default, tek2plot -T hpgl will draw with a fixed set of pens. Which pens are present
may be specified by setting the HPGL_PENS environment variable. If HPGL_VERSION is "1",
the default value of HPGL_PENS is "1=black"; if HPGL_VERSION is "1.5" or "2", the default
value of HPGL_PENS is "1=black:2=red:3=green:4=yellow:5=blue:6=magenta:7=cyan".
The format should be self-explanatory. By setting HPGL_PENS, you may specify a color for
any pen in the range #1. . . #31. For information on what color names are recognized, see
Appendix B [Color Names], page 166. Pen #1 must always be present, though it need not
be black. Any pen in the range #2. . . #31 may be omitted.
If HPGL_VERSION is "2" then tek2plot -T hpgl will also be affected by the environment
variable HPGL_ASSIGN_COLORS. If the value of this variable is "yes", then tek2plot -T
Chapter 5: The tek2plot Program 55

hpgl will not be restricted to the palette specified in HPGL_PENS: it will assign colors to
“logical pens” in the range #1. . . #31, as needed. The default value is "no" because other
than color LaserJet printers and DesignJet plotters, not many HP-GL/2 devices allow the
assignment of colors to logical pens. In particular, HP-GL/2 pen plotters do not.
Chapter 6: The plotfont Utility 56

6 The plotfont Utility

6.1 How to use plotfont

GNU plotfont is a simple utility that will produce a character map for any font available to
the GNU plotting utilities graph, plot, pic2plot, and tek2plot, and the GNU libplot
graphics library on which they are based. The map may be displayed on an X Window
System display, or produced in any of several output formats. The ‘-T’ option is used to
specify the desired output format. Supported output formats include "X", "png", "pnm",
"gif", "svg", "ai", "ps", "cgm", "fig", "pcl", "hpgl", "regis", "tek", and "meta" (the
default).
Which fonts are available depends on the choice of display or output format. To get a
list of the available fonts, use the ‘--help-fonts’ option. For example,
plotfont -T ps --help-fonts
will list the fonts that are available when producing Postscript output. One of these fonts
is "Times-Roman". Doing
plotfont -T ps Times-Roman > map.ps
will produce a character map of the lower half of this font, which consists of printable ASCII
characters. The map will be a 12x8 grid, with a character centered in each grid cell. If you
include the ‘-2’ option, you will get a map of the upper half of the font.
Most built-in fonts are ISO-Latin-1 fonts, which means that the upper half is arranged
according to the ISO-Latin-1 encoding. The "HersheyCyrillic" font is one that is not. If
you do
plotfont -T ps -2 HersheyCyrillic > map.ps
you will get a map that illustrates its arrangment, which is called KOI8-R. The KOI8-R
arrangement is the standard for Unix and networking applications in the former Soviet
Union. So-called dingbats fonts, such as "ZapfDingbats" and "Wingdings", also have an
individualistic layout. In most installations of the plotting utilities, the Wingdings font is
not available when producing Postscript output. However, it is available when producing
output in PCL 5 or HP-GL/2 format. If you do
plotfont -T hpgl Wingdings > map.plt
you will get a Wingdings character map, in HP-GL/2 format, that may be imported into
any application that understands HP-GL/2. Similarly, plotfont -T pcl Wingdings will
produce a Wingdings character map in PCL 5 format, which may be printed on a LaserJet
or other PCL 5 device.
In all, more than a hundred fonts are built into the plotting utilities. See Section A.1
[Text Fonts], page 144. Actually, if you are using the plotting utilities to display output on
an X display, you are not restricted to the built-in fonts. Doing
plotfont -T X --help-fonts
produces a list of the built-in fonts that are available, including both Hershey and Postscript
fonts. But fonts available on your X display may also be used. The xlsfonts command
will list the core X fonts available on your X display, most font names being given in what
is called XLFD format. The plotting utilities refer to core X fonts by shortened versions
Chapter 6: The plotfont Utility 57

of their XLFD names. For example, the font "CharterBT-Roman" is available on many
X displays. Its XLFD name is "-bitstream-charter-medium-r-normal–0-0-0-0-p-0-iso8859-
1", and its shortened XLFD name is "charter-medium-r-normal". If you do
plotfont -T X charter-medium-r-normal
then a character map for this font will be displayed in a popped-up X window.
When using the ‘-T X’ option, you may also use the ‘--bitmap-size’ option to choose the
size of the popped-up window. Modern X displays can scale fonts by different amounts in
the horizontal and vertical directions. If, for example, you add ‘--bitmap-size 600x300’ to
the above command line, both the character map and the CharterBT-Roman font within it
will be scaled in this way.

6.2 plotfont command-line options

The plotfont font display utility will produce a character map for any of the fonts available
to the GNU plotting utilities graph, plot, pic2plot, and tek2plot, and the GNU libplot
graphics library on which they are based. The map may be produced in any supported
output format, or displayed on an X Window System display. The output format is specified
with the ‘-T’ option.
The names of the fonts for which a character map will be produced may appear anywhere
on the plotfont command line. That is, the relative order of font names and command-
line options does not matter. The character map is written to standard output, unless the
‘-T X’ option is specified. In that case the character map is displayed in a window on an
X Window System display, and there is no output file.
The possible options are listed below. There are three sorts of option:
1. General options.
2. Options relevant only to raw plotfont, i.e., relevant only if no output format is specified
with the ‘-T’ option.
3. Options requesting information (e.g., ‘--help’).
Each option that takes an argument is followed, in parentheses, by the type and default
value of the argument.
The following are general options.
‘-1’
‘--lower-half’
Generate a character map for the lower half of each specified font. This is the
default.
‘-2’
‘--upper-half’
Generate a character map for the upper half of each specified font.
‘-o’
‘--octal’ Number the characters in octal rather than in decimal (the default).
‘-x’
‘--hexadecimal’
Number the characters in hexadecimal rather than in decimal (the default).
Chapter 6: The plotfont Utility 58

‘--box’ Surround each character with a box, showing its extent to left and right. The
default is not to do this.
‘-j row’
‘--jis-row row’
Generate a character map for row row of a Japanese font arranged according
to JIS [Japanese Industrial Standard] X0208. The only such font currently
available is the HersheyEUC [Extended Unix Code] font. If used, this option
overrides the ‘-1’ and ‘-2’ options.
The valid rows are 1. . . 94. In the JIS X0208 standard, Roman characters are
located in row 3, and Japanese syllabic characters (Hiragana and Katakana)
are located in rows 4 and 5. Greek and Cyrillic characters are located in rows
6 and 7. Japanese ideographic characters (Kanji) are located in rows 16. . . 84.
Rows 16. . . 47 contain the JIS Level 1 Kanji, which are the most frequently
used. They are arranged according to On (old Chinese) reading. Rows 48. . . 84
contain the less frequently used JIS Level 2 Kanji.
The HersheyEUC font contains 596 of the 2965 Level 1 Kanji, and seven of
the Level 2 Kanji. It uses the 8-bit EUC-JP encoding. This encoding is a
multibyte encoding that includes the ASCII character set as well as the JIS
X0208 characters. It represents each ASCII character in the usual way, i.e., as
a single byte that does not have its high bit set. Each JIS X0208 character is
represented as two bytes, each with the high bit set. The first byte contains the
row number (plus 32), and the second byte contains the character number.
‘-T type’
‘--output-format type’
(String, default "meta".) Select an output format of type type, which may
be one of the strings "X", "png", "pnm", "gif", "svg", "ai", "ps", "cgm",
"fig", "pcl", "hpgl", "regis", "tek", and "meta". These refer respectively to
the X Window System, PNG format, portable anymap (PBM/PGM/PPM) for-
mat, pseudo-GIF format, the XML-based Scalable Vector Graphics format, the
format used by Adobe Illustrator, idraw-editable Postscript, the WebCGM for-
mat for Web-based vector graphics, the format used by the xfig drawing editor,
the Hewlett–Packard PCL 5 printer language, the Hewlett–Packard Graphics
Language (by default, HP-GL/2), the ReGIS (remote graphics instruction set)
format developed by DEC, Tektronix format, and device-independent GNU
graphics metafile format. The option ‘--display-type’ is an obsolete alterna-
tive to ‘--output-format’.
Files in PNG, PNM, pseudo-GIF, SVG, AI, or Fig format may contain only a
single page of graphics. So if the ‘-T png’ option, the ‘-T pnm’ option, the ‘-T
gif’ option, the ‘-T svg’ option, the ‘-T ai’ option, or the ‘-T fig’ option is
used, a character map will be produced for only the first-specified font.
‘--bg-color name’
(String, default "white".) Set the color used for the background to be name.
This is relevant only to plotfont -T X, plotfont -T png, plotfont -T pnm,
plotfont -T gif, plotfont -T cgm, plotfont -T regis, and plotfont -T
meta. An unrecognized name sets the color to the default. For information
Chapter 6: The plotfont Utility 59

on what names are recognized, see Appendix B [Color Names], page 166.
The environment variable BG_COLOR can equally well be used to specify the
background color.
If the ‘-T png’ or ‘-T gif’ option is used, a transparent PNG file or a transparent
pseudo-GIF, respectively, may be produced by setting the TRANSPARENT_COLOR
environment variable to the name of the background color. See Section 6.3
[plotfont Environment], page 61. If the ‘-T svg’ or ‘-T cgm’ option is used, an
output file without a background may be produced by setting the background
color to "none".
‘--bitmap-size bitmap_size’
(String, default "570x570".) Set the size of the graphics display in which the
character map will be drawn, in terms of pixels, to be bitmap size. This
is relevant only to plotfont -T X, plotfont -T png, plotfont -T pnm, and
plotfont -T gif, for all of which the size can be expressed in terms of pixels.
The environment variable BITMAPSIZE may equally well be used to specify the
size.
The graphics display used by plotfont -T X is a popped-up X window.
Command-line positioning of this window on an X Window System display is
supported. For example, if bitmap size is "570x570+0+0" then the window
will be popped up in the upper left corner.
If you choose a rectangular (non-square) window size, the fonts in the plot will
be scaled anisotropically, i.e., by different factors in the horizontal and vertical
direction.
For backward compatibility, plotfont -T X allows the user to set the win-
dow size and position by setting the X resource Xplot.geometry, instead of
‘--bitmap-size’ or BITMAPSIZE.
‘--emulate-color option’
(String, default "no".) If option is "yes", replace each color in the output by an
appropriate shade of gray. This is seldom useful, except when using ‘plotfont
-T pcl’ to prepare output for a PCL 5 device. (Many monochrome PCL 5
devices, such as monochrome LaserJets, do a poor job of emulating color on
their own. They usually map HP-GL/2’s seven standard pen colors, including
even yellow, to black.) You may equally well request color emulation by setting
the environment variable EMULATE_COLOR to "yes".
‘--numbering-font-name font_name’
(String, default "Helvetica" except for plotfont -T pcl, for which "Univers"
is the default, and plotfont -T png, plotfont -T pnm, plotfont -T gif,
plotfont -T hpgl, plotfont -T regis, and plotfont -T tek, for all of which
"HersheySerif" is the default.) Set the font used for the numbering of the
characters in the character map(s) to be font name.
‘--page-size pagesize’
(String, default "letter".) Set the size of the page on which the character
map(s) will be drawn. This is relevant only to plotfont -T svg, plotfont
-T ai, plotfont -T ps, plotfont -T fig, plotfont -T pcl, and plotfont -T
Chapter 6: The plotfont Utility 60

hpgl. "letter" means an 8.5 in by 11 in page. Any ISO page size in the range
"a0". . . "a4" or ANSI page size in the range "a". . . "e" may be specified ("let-
ter" is an alias for "a" and "tabloid" is an alias for "b"). "legal", "ledger",
and "b5" are recognized page sizes also. The environment variable PAGESIZE
can equally well be used to specify the page size.
For plotfont -T ai, plotfont -T ps, plotfont -T pcl, and plotfont -T fig,
the graphics display (or ‘viewport’) within which the character map is drawn
will be, by default, a square region centered on the specified page. For plotfont
-T hpgl, it will be a square region of the same size, but may be positioned dif-
ferently. Either or both of the dimensions of the graphics display can be spec-
ified explicitly. For example, pagesize could be specified as "letter,xsize=4in",
or "a4,xsize=10cm,ysize=15cm". The dimensions are allowed to be negative
(a negative dimension results in a reflection).
The position of the graphics display, relative to its default position, may option-
ally be adjusted by specifying an offset vector. For example, pagesize could be
specified as "letter,yoffset=1.2in", or "a4,xoffset=−5mm,yoffset=2.0cm". It is
also possible to position the graphics display precisely, by specifying the loca-
tion of its lower left corner relative to the lower left corner of the page. For
example, pagesize could be specified as "letter,xorigin=2in,yorigin=3in", or
"a4,xorigin=0.5cm,yorigin=0.5cm". The preceding options may be intermin-
gled.
plotfont -T svg and plotfont -T cgm ignore the "xoffset", "yoffset", "xori-
gin", and "yorigin" options, since SVG format and WebCGM format have no
notion of the Web page on which the graphics display will ultimately be posi-
tioned. However, they do respect the "xsize" and "ysize" options. For more on
page sizes, see Appendix C [Page and Viewport Sizes], page 167.
‘--pen-color name’
(String, default "black".) Set the pen color to be name. An unrecognized name
sets the pen color to the default. For information on what color names are
recognized, see Appendix B [Color Names], page 166.
‘--rotation angle’
(Float, default 0.0.) Set the rotation angle of the graphics display to be angle
degrees. The rotation is counterclockwise. The environment variable ROTATION
can equally well be used to specify the rotation angle.
This option is used for switching between portrait and landscape orientations,
which have rotation angles 0 and 90 degrees respectively. Postmodernists may
also find it useful.
‘--title-font-name font_name’
(String) Set the font used for the title of each character map to be font name.
Normally the font used for the title is the same as the font whose character set
is being displayed. This option is useful when producing character maps for
unusual fonts such as "ZapfDingbats" and "Wingdings".
The following option is relevant only to raw plotfont, i.e., relevant only if no output
format is specified with the ‘-T’ option. In this case plotfont outputs a graphics metafile,
which may be translated to other formats by invoking plot.
Chapter 6: The plotfont Utility 61

‘-O’
‘--portable-output’
Output the portable (human-readable) version of GNU metafile format, rather
than a binary version (the default). This can also be requested by setting the
environment variable META_PORTABLE to "yes".
The following options request information.
‘--help’ Print a list of command-line options, and then exit.
‘--help-fonts’
Print a table of available fonts, and then exit. The table will depend on which
output format is specified with the ‘-T’ option. plotfont -T X, plotfont
-T svg, plotfont -T ai, plotfont -T ps, plotfont -T cgm, and plotfont
-T fig each support the 35 standard Postscript fonts. plotfont -T svg,
plotfont -T ai, plotfont -T pcl, and plotfont -T hpgl support the 45
standard PCL 5 fonts, and plotfont -T pcl and plotfont -T hpgl support
a number of Hewlett–Packard vector fonts. All of the preceding, together
with plotfont -T png, plotfont -T pnm, plotfont -T gif, plotfont -T
regis, and plotfont -T tek, support a set of 22 Hershey vector fonts. Raw
plotfont in principle supports any of these fonts, since its output must be
translated to other formats with plot.
‘--list-fonts’
Like ‘--help-fonts’, but lists the fonts in a single column to facilitate piping
to other programs. If no output format is specified with the ‘-T’ option, the
full set of supported fonts is listed.
‘--version’
Print the version number of plotfont and the plotting utilities package, and
exit.

6.3 Environment variables

The behavior of plotfont is affected by several environment variables, which are the same
as those that affect graph, plot, and tek2plot. For convenience, we list them here.
We have already mentioned the environment variables BITMAPSIZE, PAGESIZE, BG_
COLOR, ‘EMULATE_COLOR’, and ROTATION. They serve as backups for the several options
‘--bitmap-size’, ‘--page-size’, ‘--bg-color’, --emulate-color, and ‘--rotation’. The
remaining environment variables are specific to individual output formats.
plotfont -T X, which pops up a window on an X Window System display and draws a
character map in it, checks the DISPLAY environment variable. The value of this variable
determines the display on which the window will be popped up.
plotfont -T png and plotfont -T gif, which produce output in PNG format and
pseudo-GIF format respectively, are affected by two environment variables. If the value
of the INTERLACE variable is "yes", the output file will be interlaced. Also, if the value of
the TRANSPARENT_COLOR environment variable is the name of a color that appears in the
output file, that color will be treated as transparent by most applications. For information
on what color names are recognized, see Appendix B [Color Names], page 166.
Chapter 6: The plotfont Utility 62

plotfont -T pnm, which produces output in Portable Anymap (PBM/PGM/PPM) for-

mat, is affected by the PNM_PORTABLE environment variable. If its value is "yes", the output
file will be in the portable (human readable) version of PBM, PGM, or PPM format, rather
than the default (binary) version.
plotfont -T cgm, which produces CGM files that comply with the WebCGM profile for
Web-based vector graphics, is affected by two environment variables. By default, a version 3
CGM file is generated. Many older CGM interpreters and viewers, such as the ones built
into Microsoft Office and other commercial software, only support version 1 CGM files. The
CGM_MAX_VERSION environment variable may be set to "1", "2", "3", or "4" (the default) to
specify a maximum value for the version number. The CGM_ENCODING variable may also be
set, to specify the type of encoding used in the CGM file. Supported values are "clear text"
(i.e., human readable) and "binary" (the default). The WebCGM profile requires that the
binary encoding be used.
plotfont -T pcl, which produces PCL 5 output for Hewlett–Packard printers, is af-
fected by the environment variable PCL_ASSIGN_COLORS. It should be set to "yes" when
producing PCL 5 output for a color printer or other color device. This will ensure accurate
color reproduction by giving the output device complete freedom in assigning colors, inter-
nally, to its “logical pens”. If it is "no" then the device will use a fixed set of colored pens,
and will emulate other colors by shading. The default is "no" because monochrome PCL 5
devices, which are more common than colored ones, must use shading to emulate color.
plotfont -T hpgl, which produces Hewlett–Packard Graphics Language output, is also
affected by several environment variables. The most important is HPGL_VERSION, which may
be set to "1", "1.5", or "2" (the default). "1" means that the output should be generic
HP-GL, "1.5" means that the output should be suitable for the HP7550A graphics plotter
and the HP758x, HP7595A and HP7596A drafting plotters (HP-GL with some HP-GL/2
extensions), and "2" means that the output should be modern HP-GL/2. If the version is
"1" or "1.5" then the only available fonts will be vector fonts.
The position of the plotfont -T hpgl graphics display on the page can be rotated
90 degrees counterclockwise by setting the HPGL_ROTATE environment variable to "yes".
This is not the same as the rotation obtained with the ‘--rotation’ option, since it both
rotates the graphics display and repositions its lower left corner toward another corner of
the page. Besides "no" and "yes", recognized values for the HPGL_ROTATE variable are
"0", "90", "180", and "270". "no" and "yes" are equivalent to "0" and "90", respectively.
"180" and "270" are supported only if HPGL_VERSION is "2" (the default).
By default, plotfont -T hpgl will draw with a fixed set of pens. Which pens are present
may be specified by setting the HPGL_PENS environment variable. If HPGL_VERSION is "1",
the default value of HPGL_PENS is "1=black"; if HPGL_VERSION is "1.5" or "2", the default
value of HPGL_PENS is "1=black:2=red:3=green:4=yellow:5=blue:6=magenta:7=cyan".
The format should be self-explanatory. By setting HPGL_PENS, you may specify a color for
any pen in the range #1. . . #31. For information on what color names are recognized, see
Appendix B [Color Names], page 166. Pen #1 must always be present, though it need not
be black. Any pen in the range #2. . . #31 may be omitted.
If HPGL_VERSION is "2" then plotfont -T hpgl will also be affected by the environment
variable HPGL_ASSIGN_COLORS. If the value of this variable is "yes", then plotfont -T
hpgl will not be restricted to the palette specified in HPGL_PENS: it will assign colors to
Chapter 6: The plotfont Utility 63

“logical pens” in the range #1. . . #31, as needed. The default value is "no" because other
than color LaserJet printers and DesignJet plotters, not many HP-GL/2 devices allow the
assignment of colors to logical pens. In particular, HP-GL/2 pen plotters do not.
plotfont -T tek, which produces output for a Tektronix terminal or emulator, checks
the TERM environment variable. If the value of TERM is a string beginning with "xterm",
"nxterm", or "kterm", it is taken as a sign that plotfont is running in an X Window
System VT100 terminal emulator: an xterm, nxterm, or kterm. Before drawing graphics,
plotfont -T tek will emit an escape sequence that causes the terminal emulator’s auxiliary
Tektronix window, which is normally hidden, to pop up. After the graphics are drawn, an
escape sequence that returns control to the original VT100 window will be emitted. The
Tektronix window will remain on the screen.
If the value of TERM is a string beginning with "kermit", "ansi.sys", or "nansi.sys", it is
taken as a sign that plotfont is running in the VT100 terminal emulator provided by
the MS-DOS version of kermit. Before drawing graphics, plotfont -T tek will emit an
escape sequence that switches the terminal emulator to Tektronix mode. Also, some of the
Tektronix control codes emitted by plotfont -T tek will be kermit-specific. There will be
a limited amount of color support, which is not normally the case (the 16 ansi.sys colors
will be supported). After drawing graphics, plotfont -T tek will emit an escape sequence
that returns the emulator to VT100 mode. The key sequence ‘ALT minus’ can be employed
manually within kermit to switch between the two modes.
Chapter 7: The spline Program 64

7 The spline Program

7.1 How to use spline

GNU spline is a program for interpolating between the data points in one or more datasets.
Each dataset would consist of values for an independent variable and a dependent variable,
which may be a vector of specified fixed length. When discussing interpolation, we call these
variables ‘t’ and ‘y’, respectively. To emphasize: t is a scalar, but in general the dependent
variable y may be a vector.
The simplest case is when there is a single input file, which is in ASCII format, and the
vector y is one-dimensional. This is the default. For example, the input file could contain
the dataset
0.0 0.0
1.0 1.0
2.0 0.0
which are the coordinates (t, y) of the data points (0,0), (1,1), and (2,0). Data points do
not need to be on different lines, nor do the t and y coordinates of a data point need to be
on the same line. However, there should be no blank lines in the input if it is to be viewed
as forming a single dataset. Also, by default the t coordinate should be monotonically
increasing, so that y may be viewed as a function of t.
You would construct a spline (the graph of an ‘interpolating function’) passing through
the points in this dataset by doing
spline input_file > output_file
To produce a Postscript plot of the spline with the graph utility, you would do
spline input_file | graph -T ps > output.ps
To display a spline on an X Window System display, you could do
echo 0 0 1 1 2 0 | spline | graph -T X
Notice that the last example avoids the use of the input file altogether. spline will read
from standard input if no files are specified on the command line, or if the special file
name ‘-’ is specified.
What exactly does spline do? First, it fits a curve (the graph of an interpolating
function) through the points in the dataset. Then it splits the interval over which the
independent variable t ranges into 100 sub-intervals, and computes the y values at each of
the 101 subdivision points. It then outputs each of the pairs (t, y). These are the coordinates
of 101 points that lie along a curve that interpolates between the points in the dataset. If
there is more than one dataset in the input (separated by blank lines), each dataset is
interpolated separately.
You may use the ‘-n’ option to replace ‘100’ by any other positive integer. You may
also use the ‘-t’ option to specify an interpolation interval that differs from the default (the
interval over which the independent variable ranges). For example, the command
echo 0 0 1 1 2 0 | spline -n 20 -t 1.0 1.5 > output_file
will produce a dataset consisting of 21 (rather than 101) data points, with t values spaced
regularly between 1.0 and 1.5 (rather than between 0.0 and 2.0). The data points will lie
along a curve passing through (0,0), (1,1), and (2,0). This curve will be a parabola.
Chapter 7: The spline Program 65

In general, the interpolating function will be a piecewise cubic spline. That is, between
each pair of adjacent ‘knots’ (points in the input dataset), y will be a cubic function of t.
This function will differ, depending on which pair of knots y lies between. At each knot,
both the slope and curvature of the cubic pieces to either side will match. In mathematical
terms, the interpolating curve will be twice continuously differentiable.
spline supports ‘adding tension’ to the interpolating curve. A nonzero value for the
tension can be specified with the ‘-T’ option. For example, a spline under considerable
tension can be computed and displayed by doing
echo 0 0 1 0 2 0 | spline -T 10 | graph -T X
As the tension parameter is increased to positive infinity, the spline will converge to a
polygonal line. You are meant to think of the spline as being drawn taut. Actually, tension
may be negative as well as positive. A spline with negative tension will tend to bow outward,
in fact to oscillate sinusoidally. But as the tension decreases to negative infinity, the spline,
though oscillatory, will again converge to a polygonal line.
If the tension is positive, its reciprocal will be the maximum range of the independent
variable t over which the spline will ‘like to curve’. Increasing the tension far above zero will
accordingly force the spline to consist of short curved sections, centered on the data points,
and sections that are almost straight. It follows that tension is a ‘dimensionful’ quantity.
If the tension is nonzero, then when the values of the independent variable are multiplied
by some common positive factor, the tension should be divided by the same factor to obtain
a scaled version of the original spline. If the tension is zero (the default, or cubic spline
case), then the computation of the spline will be unaffected by linear scaling of the data.
In mathematical terms, a spline under tension will satisfy the differential equation

y 0000 = sgn(tension)tension2 y 00

between each successive pair of knots. If the tension equals zero, which is the default, the
fourth derivative of y with respect to t will equal zero at every point. In this case, y as a
function of t will reduce to a cubic polynomial between each successive pair of knots. But
if the tension is nonzero, y will not be a polynomial function of t. It may be expressed
in terms of exponential functions, however.
Irrespective of whether or not the spline is under tension, you may specify the ‘-p’ option
if you wish the spline to be a periodic function of t. This will only work if the y values
for the first and last points in the dataset are equal. Otherwise, it would make no sense to
compute a periodic interpolation.
It is sometimes useful to interpolate between data points at the same time as they are
generated by an auxiliary program. That is, it is useful for spline to function as a real-time
filter. spline does not normally act as a filter, since computing an interpolating curve that
is as smooth as possible is a global task. But if the ‘-f’ option is specified, spline will
indeed function as a filter. A different interpolation algorithm (cubic Bessel interpolation,
which is local rather than global) will be used. If ‘-f’ is specified, ‘-p’ may not be specified.
Also, if ‘-f’ is specified then an interpolation interval (a range of t values) must be requested
explicitly with the ‘-t’ option.
Cubic Bessel interpolation is inherently less smooth than the construction of a global
cubic spline. If the ‘-f’ option is specified, the slope of the spline at each knot will be
Chapter 7: The spline Program 66

chosen by fitting a parabola through that knot, and the two adjacent knots. The slopes of
the two interpolating segments to either side of each interior knot will match at that knot,
but typically their curvatures will not. In mathematical terms, the interpolating curve will
be continuously differentiable, but in general not twice continuously differentiable. This
loss of differentiability is the price that is paid for functioning as a real-time filter.

7.2 Advanced use of spline

The preceding section explains how spline can be employed to interpolate a function y
of a scalar variable t, in the case when y is a scalar. In this section we explain how to
perform more sophisticated interpolations. This includes multidimensional interpolations,
and interpolations that are splinings of curves, rather than of functions.
spline can handle the case when y is a vector of arbitrary specified dimensionality. The
dimension can be specified with the ‘-d’ option. For example, an input file could contain
the multidimensional dataset
0.0 0.0 1.0
1.0 1.0 0.0
2.0 0.0 1.0
which are the coordinates (t, y) of the data points (0,0,1), (1,1,0), and (2,0,1). You would
construct a spline (the graph of an interpolating function) passing through the points in
this dataset by doing
spline -d 2 input_file > output_file
The option ‘-d 2’ is used because in this example, the dependent variable y is a two-
dimensional vector. Each of the components of y will be interpolated independently, and
the output file will contain points that lie along the graph of the resulting interpolating
function.
When doing multidimensional splining, you may use any of the options that apply in
the default one-dimensional case. For example, the ‘-f’ option will yield real-time cubic
Bessel interpolation. As in the one-dimensional case, if the ‘-f’ option is used then the ‘-t’
option must be used as well, to specify an interpolation interval (a range of t values). The
‘-p’ option will yield a periodic spline, i.e., the graph of a periodic vector-valued function.
For this, the first and last dataset y values must be the same.
spline can also be used to draw a curve through arbitrarily chosen points in the plane,
or in general through arbitrarily chosen points in d-dimensional space. This is not the same
as splining, at least as the term is conventionally defined. The reason is that ‘splining’ refers
to construction of a function, rather than the construction of a curve that may or may not
be the graph of a function. Not every curve is the graph of a function.
The following example shows how you may ‘spline a curve’. The command
echo 0 0 1 0 1 1 0 1 | spline -d 2 -a -s | graph -T X
will construct a curve in the plane through the four points (0,0), (1,0), (1,1), and (0,1), and
graph it on an X Window System display. The ‘-d 2’ option specifies that the dependent
variable y is two-dimensional. The ‘-a’ option specifies that t values are missing from the
input, and should be automatically generated. By default, the first t value is 0, the second
is 1, etc. The ‘-s’ option specifies that the t values should be stripped from the output.
The same technique may be used to spline a closed curve. For example, doing
Chapter 7: The spline Program 67

echo 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 | spline -d 2 -a -s -p | graph -T X

will construct and graph a closed, lozenge-shaped curve through the three points (0,0), (1,0),
and (0,1). The construction of a closed curve is guaranteed by the ‘-p’ (i.e., ‘--periodic’)
option, and by the repetition of the initial point (0,0) at the end of the sequence.
When splining a curve, whether open or closed, you may wish to substitute the ‘-A’ option
for the ‘-a’ option. Like the ‘-a’ option, the ‘-A’ option specifies that t values are missing
from the input and should be automatically generated. However, the increment from one
t value to the next will be the distance between the corresponding values of y. This scheme
for generating t values, when constructing a curve through a sequence of data points, is the
scheme that is used in the well known FITPACK subroutine library. It is probably the best
approach when the distances between successive points fluctuate considerably.
A curve through a sequence of points in the plane, whether open or closed, may cross
itself. Some interesting visual effects can be obtained by adding negative tension to such a
curve. For example, doing
echo 0 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 | spline -d 2 -a -s -p -T -14 -n 500 | graph -T X
will construct a closed curve through the three points (0,0), (1,0), and (0,1), which is
wound into curlicues. The ‘-n 500’ option is included because there are so many windings.
It specifies that 501 points should be generated, which is enough to draw a smooth curve.

7.3 spline command-line options

The spline program will interpolate vector-valued functions of a scalar variable t, and
curves in d-dimensional space. The algorithms used by spline are similar to those discussed
in D. Kincaid and [E.] W. Cheney, Numerical Analysis (2nd ed., Brooks/Cole, 1996), section
6.4, and C. de Boor, A Practical Guide to Splines (Springer-Verlag, 1978), Chapter 4.
Input file names may be specified anywhere on the command line. That is, the relative
order of font names and command-line options does not matter. If no file names are specified,
or the file name ‘-’ is specified, the standard input is read.
An input file may contain more than a single dataset. Unless the ‘-a’ or ‘-A’ options are
used (see below), each dataset is expected to consist of a sequence of data points, given as
alternating t and y values. t is the scalar independent variable, and y is the vector-valued
dependent variable. The dimensionality of y is specified with the ‘-d’ option (the default
is 1).
If the input file is in ASCII format (the default), its datasets are separated by blank
lines. An input file may also contain any number of comment lines, which must begin with
the comment character ‘#’. Comment lines are ignored. They are not treated as blank,
i.e., they do not interrupt a dataset in progress.
The options to spline are listed below. There are three sorts of option:
1. Options specifying the type of interpolation to be performed on each dataset.
2. Options specifying the input or output format.
3. Options requesting information (e.g., ‘--help’).
Options that take an argument are followed, in parentheses, by the type and default value
of the argument.
The following options specify the type of interpolation to be performed on each dataset.
Chapter 7: The spline Program 68

‘-f’
‘--filter’
Use a local interpolation algorithm (the cubic Bessel algorithm), so that spline
can be used as a real-time filter. The slope of the interpolating curve at each
point in a dataset will be chosen by fitting a quadratic function through that
point and the two adjacent points in the dataset. If ‘-f’ is specified then the
‘-t’ option, otherwise optional, must be used as well. Also, if ‘-f’ is specified
then the ‘-k’, ‘-p’, and ‘-T’ options may not be used.
If ‘-f’ is not specified, then a different (global) interpolation algorithm will be
used.
‘-k k’
‘--boundary-condition k’
(Float, default 1.0.) Set the boundary condition parameter for each constructed
spline to be k. In each of its components, the spline will satisfy the two bound-
ary conditions y 00 [0] = ky 00 [1] and y 00 [n] = ky 00 [n − 1]. Here y[0] and y[1] signify
the values of a specified component of the vector-valued dependent variable y
at the first two points of a dataset, and y[n − 1] and y[n] the values at the last
two points. Setting k to zero will yield a ‘natural’ spline, i.e., one that has zero
curvature at the two ends of the dataset. The ‘-k’ option may not be used if
‘-f’ or ‘-p’ is specified.
‘-n n’
‘--number-of-intervals n’
(Positive integer, default 100.) Subdivide the interval over which interpolation
occurs into n subintervals. The number of data points computed, and written
to the output, will be n + 1.
‘-p’
‘--periodic’
Construct a periodic spline. If this option is specified, the y values for the first
and last points in each dataset must be equal. The ‘-f’ and ‘-k’ options may
not be used if ‘-p’ is specified.
‘-T tension’
‘--tension tension’
(Float, default 0.0.) Set the tension in each interpolating spline to be tension.
Between each pair of successive points in a dataset, the constructed spline
will satisfy the differential equation y 0000 = sgn(tension)tension2 y 00 in each of
its components. If tension equals zero, the spline will be piecewise cubic. As
tension increases to positive infinity, the spline will converge to a polygonal line.
The ‘-T’ option may not be used if ‘-f’ is specified.
‘-t tmin tmax [tspacing]’
‘--t-limits tmin tmax [tspacing]’
For each dataset, set the interval over which interpolation occurs to be the
interval between tmin and tmax. If tspacing is not specified, the interval will
be divided into the number of subintervals specified by the ‘-n’ option. If the
‘-t’ option is not used, the interval over which interpolation occurs will be
the entire range of the independent variable in the dataset. The ‘-t’ option
Chapter 7: The spline Program 69

must always be used if the ‘-f’ option is used to request filter-like behavior (see
above).
The following options specify the format of the input file(s) and the output file.
‘-d dimension’
‘--y-dimension dimension’
(Integer, default 1.) Set the dimensionality of the dependent variable y in the
input and output files to be dimension.
‘-I data-format’
‘--input-format data-format’
(Character, default ‘a’.) Set the data format for the input file(s) to be data-
format. The possible data formats are as follows.
‘a’ ASCII format. Each file is a sequence of floating point numbers,
interpreted as the t and y coordinates of the successive data points
in a dataset. If y is d-dimensional, there will be d + 1 numbers for
each point. The t and y coordinates of a point need not appear on
the same line, and points need not appear on different lines. But if
a blank line occurs (i.e., two newlines in succession are seen), it is
interpreted as the end of a dataset, and the beginning of the next.
‘f’ Single precision binary format. Each file is a sequence of floating
point numbers, interpreted as the t and y coordinates of the suc-
cessive data points in a dataset. If y is d-dimensional, there will be
d + 1 numbers for each point. Successive datasets are separated by
a single occurrence of the quantity FLT_MAX, which is the largest
possible single precision floating point number. On most machines
this is approximately 3.4 × 1038 .
‘d’ Double precision binary format. Each file is a sequence of dou-
ble precision floating point numbers, interpreted as the t and y
coordinates of the successive data points in a dataset. If y is d-
dimensional, there will be d + 1 numbers for each point. Successive
datasets are separated by a single occurrence of the quantity DBL_
MAX, which is the largest possible double precision floating point
number. On most machines this is approximately 1.8 × 10308 .
‘i’ Integer binary format. Each file is a sequence of integers, inter-
preted as the t and y coordinates of the successive data points in
a dataset. If y is d-dimensional, there will be d + 1 numbers for
each point. Successive datasets are separated by a single occur-
rence of the quantity INT_MAX, which is the largest possible integer.
On most machines this is 231 − 1.
‘-a [step_size [lower_limit]]’
‘--auto-abscissa [step_size [lower_limit]]’
(Floats, defaults 1.0 and 0.0.) Automatically generate values for the inde-
pendent variable (t). Irrespective of data format (‘a’, ‘f’, ‘d’, or ‘i’), this op-
tion specifies that the values of the independent variable (t) are missing from
Chapter 7: The spline Program 70

the input file: the dataset(s) to be read contain only values of the dependent
variable (y), so that if y is d-dimensional, there will be only d numbers for each
point. The increment from each t value to the next will be step size, and the
first t value will be lower limit.
‘-A’
‘--auto-dist-abscissa’
Automatically generate values for the independent variable (t). This is a variant
form of the ‘-a’ option. The increment from each t value to the next will be
the distance between the corresponding y values, and the first t value will be
0.0. This option is useful when interpolating curves rather than functions (see
Section 7.2 [Advanced Use of spline], page 66).
‘-O data-format’
‘--output-format data-format’
(Character, default ‘a’.) Set the data format for the output file to be data-
format. The interpretation of the data-format argument is the same as for the
‘-I’ option.
‘-P significant-digits’
‘--precision significant-digits’
(Positive integer, default 6.) Set the numerical precision for the t and y values
in the output file to be significant-digits. This takes effect only if the output
file is written in ‘a’ format, i.e., in ASCII.
‘-s’
‘--suppress-abscissa’
Omit the independent variable t from the output file; for each point, supply only
the dependent variable y. If y is d-dimensional, there will be only d numbers
for each point, not d + 1. This option is useful when interpolating curves rather
than functions (see Section 7.2 [Advanced Use of spline], page 66).
The following options request information.
‘--help’ Print a list of command-line options, and then exit.
‘--version’
Print the version number of spline and the plotting utilities package, and exit.
Chapter 8: The ode Program 71

8 The ode Program

The GNU ode utility can produce a numerical solution to the initial value problem for many
systems of first-order ordinary differential equations (ODE’s). ode can also be used to solve
systems of higher-order ODE’s, since a simple procedure converts an n’th-order equation
into n first-order equations. The output of ode can easily be piped to graph, so that one
or more solution curves may be plotted as they are generated.
Three distinct schemes for numerical solution are implemented: Runge–Kutta–
Fehlberg (the default), Adams–Moulton, and Euler. The Runge–Kutta–Fehlberg and
Adams–Moulton schemes are available with adaptive stepsize.

8.1 Mathematical basics

We begin with some standard definitions. A differential equation is an equation involving
an unknown function and its derivatives. A differential equation is ordinary if the unknown
function depends on only one independent variable, often denoted t. The order of the differ-
ential equation is the order of the highest-order derivative in the equation. One speaks of a
family, or system of equations when more than one equation is involved. If the equations are
dependent on one another, they are said to be coupled. A solution is any function satisfying
the equations. An initial value problem is present when there exist subsidiary conditions
on the unknown function and its derivatives, all of which are given at the same value of the
independent variable. In principle, such an ‘initial condition’ specifies a unique solution.
Questions about the existence and uniqueness of a solution, along with further terminology,
are discussed in any introductory text. (See Chapter 1 of Birkhoff and Rota’s Ordinary
Differential Equations. For this and other references relevant to ode, see Section 8.9 [ODE
Bibliography], page 89.)
In practical problems, the solution of a differential equation is usually not expressible
in terms of elementary functions. Hence the need for a numerical solution.
A numerical scheme for solving an initial value problem produces an approximate solu-
tion, using only functional evaluations and the operations of arithmetic. ode solves first-
order initial value problems of the form:
x0 = f (t, x, y, . . . , z)
y 0 = g(t, x, y, . . . , z)
.
.
.
z 0 = h(t, x, y, . . . , z)
given the initial values for each dependent variable at the initial value of the independent
variable t, i.e.,
x(a) = b
y(a) = c
.
.
.
z(a) = d
t = a
Chapter 8: The ode Program 72

where a, b, c, . . . , d are constants.

For ode to be able to solve such a problem numerically, the functions f, g, . . . , h must be
expressed, using the usual operators (plus, minus, multiplication, division, and exponentia-
tion), in terms of certain basic functions that ode recognizes. These are the same functions
that the plotting program gnuplot recognizes. Moreover, each of f, g, . . . , h must be given
explicitly. ode cannot deal with a system in which one or more of the first derivatives is
defined implicitly rather than explicitly.
All schemes for numerical solution involve the calculation of an approximate solution at
discrete values of the independent variable t, where the ‘stepsize’ (the difference between
any two successive values of t, usually denoted h) may be constant or chosen adaptively.
In general, as the stepsize decreases the solution becomes more accurate. In ode, the step-
size can be adjusted by the user.

8.2 Simple examples using ode

The following examples should illustrate the procedure of stating an initial value prob-
lem and solving it with ode. If these examples are too elementary, see Section 8.8 [Input
Language], page 85, for a formal specification of the ode input language. There is also a di-
rectory containing examples of ode input, which is distributed along with the GNU plotting
utilities. On most systems it is installed as ‘/usr/share/ode’ or ‘/usr/local/share/ode’.
Our first example is a simple one, namely
y 0 (t) = y(t)
with the initial condition
y(0) = 1
The solution to this differential equation is
y(t) = et .
In particular
y(1) = e1 = 2.718282
to seven digits of accuracy.
You may obtain this result with the aid of ode by typing on the command line the
sequence of commands
ode
y’ = y
y = 1
print t, y
step 0, 1
Two columns of numbers will appear. Each line will show the value of the independent
variable t, and the value of the variable y, as t is ‘stepped’ from 0 to 1. The last line will
be
1 2.718282
as expected. You may use the ‘-p’ option to change the precision. If, for example, you type
‘ode -p 10’ rather than ‘ode’, you will get ten digits of accuracy in the output, rather than
seven (the default).
Chapter 8: The ode Program 73

After the above output, ode will wait for further instructions. Entering for example the
line
step 1, 0
should yield two more columns of numbers, containing the values of t and y that are com-
puted when t is stepped back from 1 to 0. You could type instead
step 1, 2
to increase rather than decrease t. To exit ode, you would type a line containing only ‘.’,
i.e. a single period, and tap ‘return’. ode will also exit if it sees an end-of-file indicator in
its input stream, which you may send from your terminal by typing control-D.
Each line of the preceding example should be self-explanatory. A ‘step’ statement sets
the beginning and the end of an interval over which the independent variable (here, t) will
range, and causes ode to set the numerical scheme in motion. The initial value appearing
in the first ‘step’ statement (i.e., 0) and the assignment statement
y = 1
are equivalent to the initial condition y(0) = 1. The statements ‘y’ = y’ and ‘y = 1’ are
very different: ‘y’ = y’ defines a way of computing the derivative of y, while ‘y = 1’ sets
the initial value of y. Whenever a ‘step’ statement is encountered, ode tries to step the
independent variable through the interval it specifies. Which values are to be printed at
each step is specified by the most recent ‘print’ statement. For example,
print t, y, y’
would cause the current value of the independent variable t, the variable y, and its derivative
to be printed at each step.
To illustrate ode’s ability to take its input or the initial part of its input from a file, you
could prepare a file containing the following lines:
# an ode to Euler
y = 1
y’ = y
print t, y, y’
Call this file ‘euler’. (The ‘#’ line is a comment line, which may appear at any point. Ev-
erything from the ‘#’ to the end of the line on which it appears will be ignored.) To process
this file with ode, you could type on your terminal
ode -f euler
step 0, 1
These two lines cause ode to read the file ‘euler’, and the stepping to take place. You will
now get three quantities (t, y, and y 0 ) printed at each of the values of t between 0 and 1.
At the conclusion of the stepping, ode will wait for any further commands to be input from
the terminal. This example illustrates that
ode -f euler
is not equivalent to
ode < euler
The latter would cause ode to take all its input from the file ‘euler’, while the former
allows subsequent input from the terminal. For the latter to produce output, you would
Chapter 8: The ode Program 74

need to include a ‘step’ line at the end of the file. You would not need to include a ‘.’ line,
however. ‘.’ is used to terminate input only when input is being read from a terminal.
A second simple example involves the numerical solution of a second-order differential
equation. Consider the initial value problem
y 00 (t) = −y(t)
y(0) = 0
y 0 (0) = 1
Its solution would be
y(t) = sin(t)
To solve this problem using ode, you must express this second-order equation as two first-
order equations. Toward this end you would introduce a new function, called yp say, of the
independent variable t. The pair of equations
y 0 = yp
yp0 = −y
would be equivalent to the single equation above. This sort of reduction of an n’th order
problem to n first order problems is a standard technique.
To plot the variable y as a function of the variable t, you could create a file containing
the lines
# sine : y’’(t) = -y(t), y(0) = 0, y’(0) = 1
sine’ = cosine
cosine’ = -sine
sine = 0
cosine = 1
print t, sine
(y and yp have been renamed sine and cosine, since that is what they will be.) Call this
file ‘sine’. To display the generated data points on an X Window System display as they
are generated, you would type
ode -f sine | graph -T X -x 0 10 -y -1 1
step 0, 2*PI
.
After you type the ode line, graph -T X will pop up a window, and after you type the ‘step’
line, the generated dataset will be drawn in it. The ‘-x 0 10’ and ‘-y -1 1’ options, which
set the bounds for the two axes, are necessary if you wish to display points in real time:
as they are generated. If the axis bounds were not specified on the command line, graph
-T X would wait until all points are read from the input before determining the bounds,
and drawing the plot.
A slight modification of this example, showing how ode can generate several datasets
in succession and plot them on the same graph, would be the following. Suppose that you
type on your terminal the following lines.
ode -f sine | graph -T X -C -x 0 10 -y -1 1
step 0, PI
step PI, 2*PI
step 2*PI, 3*PI
.
Chapter 8: The ode Program 75

Then the sine curve will be traced out in three stages. Since the output from each ‘step’
statement ends with a blank line, graph -T X will treat each section of the sine curve as a
different dataset. If you are using a color display, each of the three sections will be plotted in
a different color. This is a feature provided by graph, which normally changes its linemode
after each dataset it reads. If you do not like this feature, you may turn it off by using
graph -T X -B instead of graph -T X.
In the above examples, you could use any of the other variants of graph instead of graph
-T X. For example, you could use graph -T ps to obtain a plot in encapsulated Postscript
format, by typing
ode -f sine | graph -T ps > plot.ps
step 0, 2*PI
.
You should note that of the variants of graph, the variants graph -T png, graph -T pnm,
graph -T gif, graph -T svg, graph -T ai, graph -T ps, graph -T cgm, graph -T fig,
graph -T pcl and graph -T hpgl do not produce output in real time, even when the axis
bounds are specified with the ‘-x’ and ‘-y’ options. So if any of these variants is used, the
plot will be produced only when input from ode is terminated, which will occur when you
type ‘.’.
In the preceding examples, the derivatives of the dependent variables were specified by
comparatively simple expressions. They are allowed to be arbitrarily complicated functions
of the dependent variables and the independent variable. They may also involve any of the
functions that are built into ode. ode has a fair number of functions built in, including abs,
sqrt, exp, log, log10, sin, cos, tan, asin, acos, atan, sinh, cosh, tanh, asinh, acosh,
and atanh. Less familiar functions which are built into it are besj0, besj1, besy0, besy1,
erf, erfc, inverf, lgamma, gamma, norm, invnorm, ibeta, and igamma. These have the
same definitions as in the plotting program gnuplot. (All functions take a single argument,
except for ibeta, which takes three, and igamma, which takes two). ode also knows the
meaning of the constant ‘PI’, as the above examples show. The names of the preceding
functions are reserved, so, e.g., ‘cos’ and ‘sin’ may not be used as names for variables.
Other than the restriction of avoiding reserved names and keywords, the names of vari-
ables may be chosen arbitrarily. Any sequence of alphanumeric characters starting with an
alphabetic character may be used; the first 32 characters are significant. It is worth noting
that ode identifies the independent variable by the fact that it is (or should be) the only
variable that has not appeared on the left side of a differential equation or an initial value
assignment. If there is more than than one such variable then no stepping takes place;
instead, an error message is printed. If there is no such variable, a dummy independent
variable is invented and given the name ‘(indep)’, internally.

8.3 Additional examples using ode

We explain here how to use some additional features of ode. However, the discussion below
does not cover all of its capabilities. For a complete list of command-line options, see
Section 8.4 [ode Invocation], page 78.
It is easy to use ode to create plots of great beauty. An example would be a plot of a
strange attractor, namely the Lorenz attractor. Suppose that a file named ‘lorenz’ contains
the following lines.
Chapter 8: The ode Program 76

# The Lorenz model, a system of three coupled ODE’s with parameter r.

x’ = -3*(x-y)
y’ = -x*z+r*x-y
z’ = x*y-z

r = 26
x = 0; y = 1; z = 0

print x, y
step 0, 200
Then executing the command
ode < lorenz | graph -T X -C -x -10 10 -y -10 10
would produce a plot of the Lorenz attractor (strictly speaking, a plot of one of its two-
dimensional projections). You may produce a Postscript plot of the Lorenz attractor, and
print it, by doing something like
ode < lorenz | graph -T ps -x -10 10 -y -10 10 -W 0 | lpr
The ‘-W 0’ (“zero width”) option requests that graph -T ps use the thinnest line possible,
to improve the visual appearance of the plot on a printer or other Postscript device.
Besides plotting a visually striking object in real time, the Lorenz attractor example
shows how statements may be separated by semicolons, rather than appearing on different
lines. It also shows how to use symbolic constants. In the description read by ode the
parameter r is a variable like x, y, and z. But unlike them it is not updated during stepping,
since no formula for its derivative r0 is given.
Our second example deals with the interactive construction of a ‘phase portrait’: a set of
solution curves with different initial conditions. Phase portraits are of paramount interest
in the qualitative theory of differential equations, and also possess æsthetic appeal.
Since a description read by ode may contain any number of ‘step’ statements, multiple
solution curves may be plotted in a single run. The most recent ‘print’ statement will
be used with each ‘step’ statement. In practice, a phase portrait would be drawn from
a few well-chosen solution curves. Choosing a good set of solution curves may require
experimentation, which makes interactivity and real-time plotting all-important.
As an example, consider a so-called Lotka–Volterra predator–prey model. Suppose that
in a lake there are two species of fish: A (the prey) who live by eating a plentiful supply
of plants, and B (the predator) who eat A. Let x(t) be the population of A and y(t) the
population of B at time t. A crude model for the interaction of A and B is given by the
equations
x0 = x(a − by)
y 0 = y(cx − d)
where a, b, c, d are positive constants. To draw a phase portrait for this system interactively,
you could type
ode | graph -T X -C -x 0 5 -y 0 5
x’ = (a - b*y) * x
y’ = (c*x - d) * y
a = 1; b = 1; c = 1; d = 1;
print x, y
Chapter 8: The ode Program 77

x = 1; y = 2
step 0, 10
x = 1; y = 3
step 0, 10
x = 1; y = 4
step 0, 10
x = 1; y = 5
step 0, 10
.
Four curves will be drawn in succession, one per ‘step’ line. They will be periodic; this
periodicity is similar to the fluctuations between predator and prey populations that occur
in real-world ecosystems. On a color display the curves will appear in different colors, since
by default, graph changes the linemode between datasets. That feature may be turned off
by using graph -T X -B rather than graph -T X.
It is sometimes useful to use ode and graph to plot discrete points, which are not joined
by line segments to form a curve. Our third example illustrates this. Suppose the file
‘atwoods’ contains the lines
m = 1
M = 1.0625
a = 0.5; adot = 0
l = 10; ldot = 0

ldot’ = ( m * l * adot * adot - M * 9.8 + m * 9.8 * cos(a) ) / (m + M)

l’ = ldot
adot’ = (-1/l) * (9.8 * sin(a) + 2 * adot * ldot)
a’ = adot

print l, ldot
step 0, 400
The first few lines describe the functioning of a so-called swinging Atwood’s machine. An
ordinary Atwood’s machine consists of a taut cord draped over a pulley, with a mass attached
to the cord at each end. Normally, the heavier mass (M ) would win against the lighter
mass (m), and draw it upward. A swinging Atwood’s machine allows the lighter mass to
swing back and forth as well as move vertically.
The ‘print l, ldot’ statement requests that the vertical position and vertical velocity
of the lighter mass be printed out at each step. If you run the command
ode < atwoods | graph -T X -x 9 11 -y -1 1 -m 0 -S 1 -X l -Y ldot
you will obtain a real-time plot. The ‘-m 0’ option requests that successive data points
not be joined by line segments, and the ‘-S 1’ option requests that plotting symbol #1
(a dot) be plotted at the location of each point. As you will see if you run this command,
the heavy mass does not win against the lighter mass. Instead the machine oscillates non-
periodically. Since the motion is non-periodic, the plot benefits from being drawn as a
sequence of unconnected points.
We conclude by mentioning a few features of ode that may be useful when things are
not going quite right. One of them is the ‘examine’ statement. It may be used to discover
Chapter 8: The ode Program 78

pertinent information about any variable in a system. For details, see Section 8.8 [Input
Language], page 85.
Another useful feature is that the ‘print’ statement may be used to print out more
than just the value of a variable. As we have seen, if the name of the variable is followed
by ‘’’, the derivative of the variable will be printed instead. In a similar way, following
the variable name with ‘?’, ‘!’, or ‘~’ prints respectively the relative single-step error, the
absolute single-step error, or the accumulated error (not currently implemented). These
quantities are discussed in Section 8.6 [Numerical Error], page 81.
The ‘print’ statement may be more complicated than was shown in the preceding ex-
amples. Its general structure is
print <pr-list> [every <const>] [from <const>]
The bracket notation ‘[...]’ means that the enclosed statements are optional. Until now
we have not mentioned the ‘every’ clause or the ‘from’ clause. The <pr-list> is familiar,
however; it is simply a comma-separated list of variables. For example, in the statement
print t, y, y’ every 5 from 1
the <pr-list> is <t, y, y’>. The clauses ‘every 5’ and ‘from 1’ specify that printing
should take place after every fifth step, and that the printing should begin when the inde-
pendent variable t reaches 1. An ‘every’ clause is useful if you wish to ‘thin out’ the output
generated by a ‘step’ statement, and a ‘from’ clause is useful if you wish to view only the
final portion of a solution curve.

8.4 ode command-line options

The command-line options to ode are listed below. There are several sorts of option:
1. Options affecting the way in which input is read.
2. Options affecting the format of the output.
3. Options affecting the choice of numerical solution scheme, and the error bounds that
will be imposed on it.
4. Options that request information.
The following option affects the way input is read.
‘-f filename’
‘--input-file filename’
Read input from filename before reading from standard input.
The following options affect the output format.
‘-p significant-digits’
‘--precision significant-digits’
(Positive integer, default 6.) When printing numerical results, use a precision
specified by significant-digits. If this option is given, the print format will be
scientific notation.
‘-t’
‘--title’ Print a title line at the head of the output, naming the columns. If this option
is given, the print format will be scientific notation.
Chapter 8: The ode Program 79

The following options specify the numerical integration scheme. Only one of the three basic
option ‘-R’, ‘-A’, and ‘-E’ may be specified. The default is ‘-R’ (Runge–Kutta–Fehlberg).

‘-R [stepsize]’
‘--runge-kutta [stepsize]’
Use a fifth-order Runge–Kutta–Fehlberg algorithm, with an adaptive stepsize
unless a constant stepsize is specified. When a constant stepsize is specified
and no error analysis is requested, then a classical fourth-order Runge–Kutta
scheme is used.

‘-A [stepsize]’
‘--adams-moulton [stepsize]’
Use a fourth-order Adams–Moulton predictor–corrector scheme, with an adap-
tive stepsize unless a constant stepsize, stepsize, is specified. The Runge–Kutta–
Fehlberg algorithm is used to get past ‘bad’ points (if any).

‘-E [stepsize]’
‘--euler [stepsize]’
Use a ‘quick and dirty’ Euler scheme, with a constant stepsize. The default
value of stepsize is 0.1. Not recommended for serious applications.
The error bound options ‘-r’ and ‘-e’ (see below) may not be used if ‘-E’ is
specified.

‘-h hmin [hmax]’

‘--step-size-bound hmin [hmax]’
Use a lower bound hmin on the stepsize. The numerical scheme will not let
the stepsize go below hmin. The default is to allow the stepsize to shrink to
the machine limit, i.e., the minimum nonzero double-precision floating point
number. The optional argument hmax, if included, specifies a maximum value
for the stepsize. It is useful in preventing the numerical routine from skipping
quickly over an interesting region.

The following options set the error bounds on the numerical solution scheme.

‘-r rmax [rmin]’

‘--relative-error-bound rmax [rmin]’
‘-e emax [emin]’
‘--absolute-error-bound emax [emin]’
The ‘-r’ option sets an upper bound on the relative single-step error. If the
‘-r’ option is used, the relative single-step error in any dependent variable will
never exceed rmax (the default for which is 10−9 ). If this should occur, the
solution will be abandoned and an error message will be printed. If the stepsize
is not constant, the stepsize will be decreased ‘adaptively’, so that the upper
bound on the single-step error is not violated. Thus, choosing a smaller upper
bound on the single-step error will cause smaller stepsizes to be chosen. A lower
bound rmin may optionally be specified, to suggest when the stepsize should
be increased (the default for rmin is rmax/1000). The ‘-e’ option is similar to
‘-r’, but bounds the absolute rather than the relative single-step error.
Chapter 8: The ode Program 80

‘-s’
‘--suppress-error-bound’
Suppress the ceiling on single-step error, allowing ode to continue even if this
ceiling is exceeded. This may result in large numerical errors.
Finally, the following options request information.
‘--help’ Print a list of command-line options, and then exit.
‘--version’
Print the version number of ode and the plotting utilities package, and exit.

8.5 Diagnostic messages

ode is always in one of two states:
• Reading input. The input includes a specification of a system of ordinary differential
equations, together with instructions for solving it numerically: a ‘print’ line and a
‘step’ line.
• Numerically solving a system, and printing the resulting output.
ode moves from the first to the second state after it sees and processes a ‘step’ line.
It returns to the first state after the generated output has been printed. Errors may occur
in the ‘reading’ state or the ‘solving’ state, and may terminate computations or even cause
ode to exit. We now explain the possible sorts of error.
While reading input, ode may encounter a syntax error: an ungrammatical line that it
is unable to parse. (For a summary of its input grammar, see Section 8.8 [Input Language],
page 85.) If so, it emits the error message
ode::nnn: syntax error
where ‘nnn’ is the number of the line containing the error. When the ‘-f filename’ option
is used to specify an input file, the error message will read
ode:filename:nnn: syntax error
for errors encountered inside the input file. Subsequently, when ode begins reading the
standard input, line numbers will start over again from 1.
No effort is made to recover from syntax errors in the input. However, there is a meager
effort to resynchronize, so that more than one syntax error in a file may be found at the
same time.
It is also possible that a fatal arithmetic exception (such as a division by zero, or a
floating point overflow) may occur while ode is reading input. If such an exception occurs,
ode will print an “Floating point exception” error message and exit. Arithmetic exceptions
are machine-dependent. On some machines, the line
y = 1/0
would induce an arithmetic exception. Also on some machines (not necessarily the same
ones), the lines
y = 1e100
z = y^4
Chapter 8: The ode Program 81

would induce an arithmetic exception. That is because on most machines, the double
precision quantities that ode uses internally are limited to a maximum size of approximately
1.8 × 10308 .
When ode is in the ‘solving’ state, i.e., computing a numerical solution, similar arithmetic
exceptions may occur. If so, the solution will be interrupted and a message resembling
ode: arithmetic exception while calculating y’
will be printed. However, ode will not exit; the exception will be ‘caught’. ode itself
recognizes the following exceptional conditions: square root of a negative number, logarithm
of a non-positive number, and negative number raised to a non-integer power. ode will catch
any of these operations before it is performed, and print an error message specifying which
illegal operation it has encountered.
ode: square root of a negative number while calculating y’
would be a typical error message.
If the machine on which ode is running supports the ‘matherr’ facility for reporting
errors in the computation of standard mathematical functions, it will be used. This facility
reports domain errors and range errors (overflows, underflows, and losses of significance)
that could occur when evaluating such functions as ‘log’, ‘gamma’, etc.; again, before they
are performed. If the matherr facility is present, the error message will be fairly informative.
For example, the error message
ode: range error (overflow) in lgamma while calculating y’
could be generated if the logarithmic gamma function ‘lgamma’ is evaluated at a value of its
argument that is too large. The generation of any such message, except a message warning
of an underflow, will cause the numerical solution to be interrupted.
There is another sort of error that may occur during numerical solution: the condition
that an error ceiling, which the user may set with the ‘-r’ option or the ‘-e’ option, is
exceeded. This too will cause the numerical solution to be abandoned, and ode to switch
back to reading input.

8.6 Numerical error and how to avoid it

This discussion is necessarily incomplete. Entire books exist on any subject mentioned below
(e.g., floating point error). Our goals are modest: first, to introduce the basic notions of error
analysis as they apply to ode; second, to steer you around the more obvious pitfalls. You
should look through a numerical analysis text (e.g., Atkinson’s Introduction to Numerical
Analysis) before beginning this discussion.
We begin with some key definitions. The error of greatest concern is the difference
between the actual solution and the numerical approximation to the solution; this is termed
the accumulated error, since the error is built up during each numerical step. Unfortunately,
an estimate of this error is usually not available without knowledge of the actual solution.
There are, however, several more usable notions of error. The single-step error, in particular,
is the difference between the actual solution and the numerical approximation to the solution
after any single step, assuming the value at the beginning of the step is correct.
The relative single-step error is the single-step error, divided by the current value of
the numerical approximation to the solution. Why not divided by the current value of the
solution itself? The reason is that the solution is not exactly known. When free to choose
Chapter 8: The ode Program 82

a stepsize, ode will do so on the basis of the relative single-step error. By default, it will
choose the stepsize so as to maintain an accuracy of eight significant digits in each step.
That is, it will choose the stepsize so as not to violate an upper bound of 10−9 on the
relative single-step error. This ceiling may be adjusted with the ‘-r’ option.
Where does numerical error come from? There are two sources. The first is the finite pre-
cision of machine computation. All computers work with floating point numbers, which are
not real numbers, but only an approximation to real numbers. However, all computations
performed by ode are done to double precision, so floating point error tends to be relatively
small. You may nonetheless detect the difference between real numbers and floating point
numbers by experimenting with the ‘-p 17’ option, which will print seventeen significant
digits. On most machines, that is the precision of a double precision floating point number.
The second source of numerical error is often called the theoretical truncation error. It is
the difference between the actual solution and the approximate solution due solely to the
numerical scheme. At the root of many numerical schemes is an infinite series; for ordinary
differential equations, it is a Taylor expansion. Since the computer cannot compute all the
terms in an infinite series, a numerical scheme necessarily uses a truncated series; hence the
term. The single-step error is the sum of the theoretical truncation error and the floating
point error, though in practice the floating point error is seldom included. The single-step
error estimated by ode consists only of the theoretical truncation error.
We say that a numerical scheme is stable, when applied to a particular initial value
problem, if the error accumulated during the solution of the problem over a fixed interval
decreases as the stepsize decreases; at least, over a wide range of step sizes. With this
definition both the Runge–Kutta–Fehlberg (‘-R’) scheme and the Adams–Moulton (‘-A’)
scheme are stable (a statement based more on experience than on theoretical results) for a
wide class of problems.
After these introductory remarks, we list some common sources of accumulated error
and instability in any numerical scheme. Usually, problems with large accumulated error
and instability are due to the single-step error in the vicinity of a ‘bad’ point being large.
1. Singularities.
ode should not be used to generate a numerical solution on any interval containing a
singularity. That is, ode should not be asked to step over points at which the system
of differential equations is singular or undefined.
You will find the definitions of singular point, regular singular point, and irregular
singular point in any good differential equations text. If you have no favorite, try
Birkhoff and Rota’s Ordinary Differential Equations, Chapter 9. Always locate and
classify the singularities of a system, if any, before applying ode.
2. Ill-posed problems.
For ode to yield an accurate numerical solution on an interval, the true solution must
be defined and well-behaved on that interval. The solution must also be real. Whenever
any of these conditions is violated, the problem is said to be ill-posed. Ill-posedness
may occur even if the system of differential equations is well-behaved on the interval.
Strange results, e.g., the stepsize suddenly shrinking to the machine limit or the solution
suddenly blowing up, may indicate ill-posedness.
As an example of ill-posedness (in fact, an undefined solution) consider the innocent-
looking problem:
Chapter 8: The ode Program 83

y0 = y2
y(1) = −1
The solution on the domain t > 0 is
y(t) = −1/t.
With this problem you must not compute a numerical solution on any interval that
includes t = 0. To convince yourself of this, try to use the ‘step’ statement
step 1, -1
on this system. How does ode react?
As another example of ill-posedness, consider the system
y 0 = 1/y
which is undefined at y = 0. The general solution is
y = ± (2(t − C))1/2 ,
so that if the condition y(2) = 2 is imposed, the solution will be (2t)1/2 . Clearly, if
the domain specified in a ‘step’ statement includes negative values of t, the generated
solution will be bogus.
In general, when using a constant stepsize you should be careful not to ‘step over’ bad
points or bad regions. When allowed to choose a stepsize adaptively, ode will often
spot bad points, but not always.
3. Critical points.
An autonomous system is one that does not include the independent variable explicitly
on the right-hand side of any differential equation. A critical point for such a system
is a point at which all right-hand sides equal zero. For example, the system
y 0 = 2x
x0 = 2y
has only one critical point, at (x, y) = (0, 0).
A critical point is sometimes referred to as a stagnation point. That is because a system
at a critical point will remain there forever, though a system near a critical point may
undergo more violent motion. Under some circumstances, passing near a critical point
may give rise to a large accumulated error.
As an exercise, solve the system above using ode, with the initial condition x(0) =
y(0) = 0. The solution should be constant in time. Now do the same with points near
the critical point. What happens?
You should always locate the critical points of a system before attempting a solution
with ode. Critical points may be classified (as equilibrium, vortex, unstable, stable,
etc.) and this classification may be of use. To find out more about this, consult any
book dealing with the qualitative theory of differential equations (e.g., Birkhoff and
Rota’s Ordinary Differential Equations, Chapter 6).
4. Unsuitable numerical schemes
If the results produced by ode are bad in the sense that instability appears to be
present, or an unusually small stepsize needs to be chosen needed in order to reduce
the single-step error to manageable levels, it may simply be that the numerical scheme
being used is not suited to the problem. For example, ode currently has no numerical
scheme which handles so-called ‘stiff’ problems very well.
Chapter 8: The ode Program 84

As an example, you may wish to examine the stiff problem:

y 0 = −100 + 100t + 1
y(0) = 1
on the domain [0, 1]. The exact solution is
y(t) = e−100t + t.
It is a useful exercise to solve this problem with ode using various numerical schemes,
stepsizes, and relative single-step error bounds, and compare the generated solution
curves with the actual solution.
There are several rough and ready heuristic checks you may perform on the accuracy of
any numerical solution produced by ode. We discuss them in turn.
1. Examine the stability of solution curves: do they converge?
That is, check how changing the stepsize affects a solution curve. As the stepsize
decreases, the curve should converge. If it does not, then the stepsize is not small
enough or the numerical scheme is not suited to the problem. In practice, you would
proceed as follows.
• If using an adaptive stepsize, superimpose the solution curves for successively
smaller bounds on the relative single-step error (obtained with, e.g., ‘-r 1e-9’,
‘-r 1e-11’, ‘-r 1e-13’, . . . ). If the curves converge then the solution is to all
appearances stable, and your accuracy is sufficient.
• If employing a constant stepsize, perform a similar analysis by successively halving
the stepsize.
The following example is one that you may wish to experiment with. Make a file named
‘qcd’ containing:
# an equation arising in QCD (quantum chromodynamics)
f’ = fp
fp’ = -f*g^2
g’ = gp
gp’ = g*f^2
f = 0; fp = -1; g = 1; gp = -1

print t, f
step 0, 5
Next make a file named ‘stability’, containing the lines:
: sserr is the bound on the relative single-step error
for sserr
do
ode -r $sserr < qcd
done | spline -n 500 | graph -T X -C
This is a ‘shell script’, which when run will superimpose numerical solutions with
specified bounds on the relative single-step error. To run it, type:
sh stability 1 .1 .01 .001
and a plot of the solutions with the specified error bounds will be drawn. The conver-
gence, showing stability, should be quite illuminating.
Chapter 8: The ode Program 85

2. Check invariants of the system: are they constant?

Many systems have invariant quantities. For example, if the system is a mathematical
model of a ‘conservative’ physical system then the ‘energy’ (a particular function of the
dependent variables of the system) should be constant in time. In general, knowledge
about the qualitative behavior of any dependent variable may be used to check the
quality of the solution.

3. Check a family of solution curves: do they diverge?

A rough idea of how error is propagated is obtained by viewing a family of solution

curves about the numerical solution in question, obtained by varying the initial con-
ditions. If they diverge sharply—that is, if two solutions which start out very close
nonetheless end up far apart—then the quality of the numerical solution is dubious.
On the other hand, if the curves do not diverge sharply then any error that is present
will in all likelihood not increase by more than an order of magnitude or so over the
interval. Problems exhibiting no sharp divergence of neighboring solution curves are
sometimes called well-conditioned.

8.7 Running time

The time required for ode to solve numerically a system of ordinary differential equations
depends on a great many factors. A few of them are: number of equations, complexity of
equations (number of operators and nature of the operators), and number of steps taken
(a very complicated function of the difficulty of solution, unless constant stepsizes are used).
The most effective way to gauge the time required for solution of a system is to clock a
short or imprecise run of the problem, and reason as follows: the time required to take two
steps is roughly twice that required for one; and there is a relationship between the number
of steps required and the relative error ceiling chosen. That relationship depends on the
numerical scheme being used, the difficulty of solution, and perhaps on the magnitude of
the error ceiling itself. A few carefully planned short runs may be used to determine this
relationship, enabling a long but imprecise run to be used as an aid in projecting the cost of
a more precise run over the same region. Lastly, if a great deal of data is printed, it is likely
that more time is spent in printing the results than in computing the numerical solution.

8.8 The ode input language formally specified

The following is a formal specification of the grammar for ode’s input language, in Backus–
Naur form. Nonterminal symbols in the grammar are enclosed in angle brackets. Terminal
tokens are in all capitals. Bare words and symbols stand for themselves.

<program> ::= ... empty ...

| <program> <statement>
Chapter 8: The ode Program 86

<statement> ::= SEP

| IDENTIFIER = <const> SEP
| IDENTIFIER ’ = <expression> SEP
| print <printlist> <optevery> <optfrom> SEP
| step <const> , <const> , <const> SEP
| step <const> , <const> SEP
| examine IDENTIFIER SEP

<printlist> ::= <printitem>

| <printlist> , <printitem>

<printitem> ::= IDENTIFIER

| IDENTIFIER ’
| IDENTIFIER ?
| IDENTIFIER !
| IDENTIFIER ~

<optevery> ::= ... empty ...

| every <const>

<optfrom> ::= ... empty ...

| from <const>

<const> ::= <expression>

<expression> ::= ( <expression> )

| <expression> + <expression>
| <expression> - <expression>
| <expression> * <expression>
| <expression> / <expression>
| <expression> ^ <expression>
| FUNCTION ( <expression> )
| - <expression>
| NUMBER
| IDENTIFIER

Since this grammar is ambiguous, the following table summarizes the precedences and
associativities of operators within expressions. Precedences decrease from top to bottom.
Chapter 8: The ode Program 87

Class Operators Associativity

Exponential ^ right
Multiplicative * / left
Additive + - left
As noted in the grammar, there are six types of nontrivial statement. We now explain
the effects (the ‘semantics’) of each type, in turn.
1. IDENTIFIER ’ = <expression>
This defines a first-order differential equation. The derivative of IDENTIFIER is specified
by <expression>. If a dynamic variable does not appear on the left side of a statement
of this form, its derivative is assumed to be zero. That is, it is a symbolic constant.
2. IDENTIFIER = <expression>
This sets the value of IDENTIFIER to the current value of <expression>. Dynamic
variables that have not been initialized in this way are set to zero.
3. step <const> , <const>
4. step <const> , <const> , <const>
A ‘step’ statement causes the numerical scheme to be executed. The first <const> is
the initial value of the independent variable. The second is its final value. The third
is a stepsize; if given, it overrides any stepsize that may be specified on the command
line. Usually the stepsize is not specified, and it varies adaptively as the computation
proceeds.
5. print <printlist> [ every <const> ] [ from <const> ]
A ‘print’ statement controls the content and frequency of the numerical output.
<printlist> is a comma-separated list of IDENTIFIERs, where each IDENTIFIER may
be followed by ‘’’, denoting the derivative, or ‘?’, denoting the relative single-step er-
ror, or ‘!’, denoting the absolute single-step error, or ‘~’, denoting the accumulated
error (not currently implemented). The specified values are printed in the order they
are found. Both the ‘every’ clause and the ‘from’ clause are optional. If the ‘every’
clause is present, a printing occurs every <const> iterations of the numerical algorithm.
The default is to print on every iteration (i.e. ‘every 1’). The first and last values are
always printed. If the ‘from’ clause is present, it means to begin printing when the
independent variable reaches or exceeds <const>. The default is to begin printing
immediately.
If no ‘print’ statement has been supplied, then the independent variable and all de-
pendent variables which have differential equations associated with them are printed.
The independent variable is printed first; the dependent variables follow in the order
their equations were given.
6. examine IDENTIFIER
An ‘examine’ statement, when executed, causes a table of interesting information about
the named variable to be printed on the standard output. For example, if the statement
‘examine y’ were encountered after execution of the ‘ode to Euler’ example discussed
elsewhere, the output would be:
Chapter 8: The ode Program 88

"y" is a dynamic variable

value:2.718282
prime:2.718282
sserr:1.121662e-09
aberr:3.245638e-09
acerr:0
code: push "y"
The phrase ‘dynamic variable’ means that there is a differential equation describing
the behavior of y. The numeric items in the table are:
value Current value of the variable.
prime Current derivative of the variable.
sserr Relative single-step error for the last step taken.
aberr Absolute single-step error for the last step taken.
acerr Total error accumulated during the most recent ‘step’ statement. Not
currently implemented.
The ‘code’ section of the table lists the stack operations required to compute the deriva-
tive of y (somewhat reminiscent of a reverse Polish calculator). This information may
be useful in discovering whether the precedences in the differential equation statement
were interpreted correctly, or in determining the time or space expense of a particu-
lar calculation. ‘push "y"’ means to load y’s value on the stack, which is all that is
required to compute its derivative in this case.
The grammar for the ode input language contains four types of terminal token:
FUNCTION, IDENTIFIER, NUMBER, and SEP. They have the following meanings.
1. FUNCTION
One of the words: abs, sqrt, exp, log, ln, log10, sin, cos, tan, asin, acos, atan,
sinh, cosh, tanh, asinh, acosh, atanh, floor, ceil, besj0, besj1, besy0, besy1,
erf, erfc, inverf, lgamma, gamma, norm, invnorm, ibeta, igamma. These are defined
to have the same meaning as in the plotting program gnuplot. All functions take a
single argument, except for ibeta, which takes three, and igamma, which takes two.
For trigonometric functions, all arguments are expressed in radians. The atan function
is defined to give a value between −PI/2 and PI/2 (inclusive).
2. IDENTIFIER
A sequence of alphanumeric characters starting with an alphabetic character. The first
32 characters are significant. Upper and lower-case letters are distinct. In identifiers,
the underscore character is considered alphabetic. Function names and keywords may
not be used as identifiers, nor may ‘PI’.
3. NUMBER
A non-empty sequence of digits possibly containing a decimal point and possibly fol-
lowed by an exponent. An exponent is ‘e’ or ‘E’, followed by an (optionally signed)
one, two, or three-digit number. All numbers and all parts of numbers are radix 10.
A number may not contain any white space. The special word ‘PI’ is a number.
4. SEP
A separator: a semicolon or a (non-escaped) newline.
Chapter 8: The ode Program 89

In the ode input language, upper and lower-case letters are distinct. Comments begin
with the character ‘#’ and continue to the end of the line. Long lines may be continued onto
a second line by ending the first line with a backslash (‘\’). That is because the combination
backslash-newline is equivalent to a space.
Spaces or tabs are required in the input whenever they are needed to separate identifiers,
numbers, and keywords from one another. Except as separators, they are ignored.

8.9 Bibliography on ode and solving differential equations

• K. E. Atkinson, An Introduction to Numerical Analysis, Wiley, 1978. Chapter 6 con-
tains a discussion of the literature on the numerical solution of ordinary differential
equations.
• G. Birkhoff and G. Rota, Ordinary Differential Equations, 4th ed., Wiley, 1989.
• N. B. Tufillaro, T. Abbott, and J. Reilly, An Experimental Approach to Nonlinear
Dynamics and Chaos, Addison–Wesley, 1992. Appendix C discusses an earlier version
of ode.
• N. B. Tufillaro, E. F. Redish, and J. S. Risley, “ode: A numerical simulation of ordinary
differential equations,” pp. 480–481 in Proceedings of the Conference on Computers in
Physics Instruction, Addison–Wesley, 1990.
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 90

9 libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library

9.1 Programming with libplot: An overview

GNU libplot 4.4 is a free function library for drawing two-dimensional vector graphics.
It can produce smooth, double-buffered animations for the X Window System, and can
export graphics files in many file formats. It is ‘device-independent’ in the sense that its
API (application programming interface) is to a large extent independent of the output
format. The API is thread-safe, so it may be used in multithreaded programs.
There are bindings for C, C++, and other languages. The C binding, which is the most
frequently used, is also called libplot, and the C++ binding, when it needs to be distin-
guished, is called libplotter. In this section we use libplot to refer to the library itself,
irrespective of binding.
The graphical objects that libplot can draw include paths, ‘adjusted labels’ (i.e., jus-
tified text strings), marker symbols, and points (i.e., pixels). Paths may be simple or
compound. A simple path is a contiguous sequence of line segments, circular arcs, elliptic
arcs, quadratic Bezier curves, and/or cubic Bezier curves. A simple path may also be a
circle, an ellipse, or a rectangle. A compound path consists of one or more nested simple
paths. User-specified filling of paths, both simple and compound, is supported (fill color
and fill rule, as well as pen color, may be specified).
There is support for maintaining a Postscript-style stack of graphics contexts, i.e., a stack
of drawing attribute sets. Path-related attributes include pen color, line thickness, line type,
cap type, join type, miter limit, fill color, fill rule, and transformation matrix, and text-
related attributes include font name, font size, text angle, and transformation matrix.
The fundamental abstraction provided by libplot is that of a Plotter. A Plotter is an
object with an interface for the drawing of vector graphics which is similar to the interface
provided by a traditional pen plotter. There are many types of Plotter, which differ in the
output format they produce. Any number of Plotters, of the same or different types, may
exist simultaneously in an application.
The drawing operations supported by Plotters of different types are identical, in agree-
ment with the principle of device independence. So a graphics application that is linked
with libplot may easily be written so as to produce output in any or all of the supported
output formats.
The following are the currently supported types of Plotter.
• X Plotters. An X Plotter, when opened, pops up a window on an X Window System
display and draws graphics in it. The window will be ‘spun off’ when the Plotter is
closed; if it is subsequently reopened, a new window will be popped up. A spun-off
window will remain on the screen but will vanish if you type ‘q’ or click your mouse in it.
Future releases may permit X Plotters, when reopened, to reuse an existing window.
• X Drawable Plotters. An X Drawable Plotter draws graphics in one or two specified
drawables associated with an X Window System display. A ‘drawable’ is either a win-
dow or a pixmap. The drawables must be passed to the Plotter as parameters. (See
Section 9.5 [Plotter Parameters], page 136.)
• PNG Plotters. A PNG Plotter produces a single page of output in PNG (Portable
Network Graphics) format, and directs it to a file or other specified output stream.
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 91

The file may be viewed or edited with many applications, such as display, which is
part of the free ImageMagick package.
• PNM Plotters. A PNM Plotter produces a single page of output in “portable anymap”
format, and directs it to a file or other specified output stream. There are three types of
portable anymap: PBM (portable bitmap, for monochrome graphics), PGM (portable
graymap), and PPM (portable pixmap, for colored graphics). The output file will be
in whichever of these three formats is most appropriate. The file may be viewed or
edited with many applications, such as display.
• GIF Plotters. A GIF Plotter produces a single page of output in a pseudo-GIF format.
Unlike true GIF format, the pseudo-GIF format does not use LZW compression: it uses
run-length encoding instead. So it does not transgress the Unisys patent that restricts
the use of LZW compression. However, the output file may be viewed or edited with any
application that understands GIF format, such as display. The creation of animated
pseudo-GIFs is supported.
• SVG Plotters. An SVG Plotter produces a single page of output in Scalable Vector
Graphics format and directs it to a file or other specified output stream. SVG is an
XML-based format for vector graphics on the Web, which is being developed by the
Graphics Activity of the W3 Consortium. The output conforms to the 3 March 2000
version of the SVG specification.
• Illustrator Plotters. An Illustrator Plotter produces a single page of output in the
format used by Adobe Illustrator, and directs it to a file or other specified output
stream. The file may be edited with Adobe Illustrator (version 5, and more recent
versions), or other applications.
• Postscript Plotters. A Postscript Plotter produces Postscript output and directs it
to a file or other specified output stream. If only a single page of graphics is drawn
on the Plotter then its output is in EPS (encapsulated Postscript) format, so it may
be included in another document. It may also be edited with the free idraw drawing
editor. See Section E.1 [idraw], page 171.
• CGM Plotters. A CGM Plotter produces output in Computer Graphics Metafile format
and directs it to a file or other specified output stream. By default, binary-encoded
version 3 CGM format is used. The output complies with the WebCGM profile for
Web-based vector graphics, so it may be displayed in any Web browser with WebCGM
support. The CGM Open Consortium has more information on WebCGM.
• Fig Plotters. A Fig Plotter produces a single page of output in Fig format and directs
it to a file or other specified output stream. The output may be edited with the free
xfig drawing editor. The xfig editor can export drawings in various other formats for
inclusion in documents. See Section E.2 [xfig], page 171.
• PCL Plotters. A PCL Plotter produces output in PCL 5 format and directs it to a file
or other specified output stream. PCL 5 is a powerful version of Hewlett–Packard’s
Printer Control Language, which supports vector graphics. The output may be sent to
a PCL 5 device such as a LaserJet printer or high-end inkjet.
• HP-GL Plotters. An HP-GL Plotter produces output in the Hewlett–Packard Graphics
Language (by default, in HP-GL/2), and directs it to a file or other specified output
stream. The output may be imported into another application, or sent to a plotter.
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 92

• ReGIS Plotters. A ReGIS Plotter produces output in ReGIS (remote graphics instruc-
tion set) format and directs it to a file or other specified output stream. The output
may be displayed on any terminal or emulator that understands ReGIS format. This
includes several terminals from DEC (in particular, the VT340, VT330, VT241, and
VT240 terminals), and dxterm, the DECwindows terminal emulation program.
• Tektronix Plotters. A Tektronix Plotter produces output in Tektronix 4014 format and
directs it to a file or other specified output stream. The output may be displayed on
any Tektronix 4014 emulator. Such an emulator is built into xterm, the X Window
System terminal emulation program. The MS-DOS version of kermit also includes
such an emulator.
• Metafile Plotters. A Metafile Plotter produces output in GNU graphics metafile format
and directs it to a file or other specified output stream. This format is an extended
version of the ‘plot(5)’ format found on some other operating systems. (See Appendix D
[Metafiles], page 169.) It may be translated to other formats by an invocation of GNU
plot. (See Chapter 3 [plot], page 30.)
A distinction among these types of Plotter is that all except X and X Drawable Plotters
write graphics to a file or other output stream. An X Plotter pops up its own windows, and
an X Drawable Plotter draws graphics in one or two X drawables.
Another distinction is that the first five types of Plotter (X, X Drawable, PNG, PNM,
and GIF) produce bitmap output, while the remaining types produce output in a vector
graphics format. In bitmap output the structure of the graphical objects is lost, but in a
vector format it is retained.
An additional distinction is that X, X Drawable, ReGIS, Tektronix and Metafile Plotters
are real-time. This means that they draw graphics or write to an output stream as the
drawing operations are invoked on them. The remaining types of Plotter are not real-time,
since their output streams can only be emitted after all functions have been called. For
PNM and GIF Plotters, this is because the bitmap must be constructed before it is written
out. For Illustrator and Postscript Plotters, it is because a ‘bounding box’ line must be
placed at the head of the output file. For a Fig Plotter, it is because color definitions must
be placed at the head of the output file.
The most important operations supported by any Plotter are openpl and closepl,
which open and close it. Graphics may be drawn, and drawing attributes set, only within
an openpl. . . closepl pair. The graphics produced within each openpl. . . closepl pair
constitute a ‘page’. In principle, any Plotter may be opened and closed arbitrarily many
times. An X Plotter displays each page in a separate X window, and Postscript, PCL, and
HP-GL Plotters render each page as a separate physical page. X Drawable, ReGIS and
Tektronix Plotters manipulate a single drawable or display, on which pages are displayed in
succession. Plotters that do not draw in real time (PNG, PNM, GIF, Illustrator, Postscript,
CGM, Fig, PCL, and HP-GL Plotters) may wait until their existence comes to an end (i.e.,
until they are deleted) before outputting their pages of graphics.
In the current release of libplot, Postscript and CGM Plotters delay outputting graph-
ics in this way, but PCL and HP-GL Plotters output each page of graphics individually, i.e.,
when closepl is invoked. PNG, PNM, GIF, SVG, Illustrator and Fig Plotters are similar,
but output only the first page. That is because PNG, PNM, GIF, SVG, Illustrator and Fig
formats support only a single page of graphics.
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 93

The graphics display, or ‘viewport’, that is drawn in by a Plotter is normally a square or

rectangular region on its output device. But when using any Plotter to draw graphics, a user
will specify the coordinates of graphical objects in device-independent ‘user’ coordinates,
not in device coordinates. A Plotter transforms user coordinates to device coordinates by
performing an affine transformation.
After invoking openpl to open a Plotter, an application would usually invoke space.
space specifies a rectangular ‘window’ in the user coordinate system that will be mapped
affinely to the viewport on the output device. (The default window is a square, with opposite
corners (0,0) and (1,1).) The transformation from user coordinates to device coordinates
may be updated at any later time by reinvoking space, or by invoking fconcat. The
fconcat operation will concatenate (i.e., compose) the current affine transformation with
any specified affine transformation. This sort of concatenation is a capability familiar from,
e.g., Postscript.
Each Plotter maintains a Postscript-style stack of graphics contexts. This makes possible
the rapid, efficient drawing of complicated pages of graphics. A graphics context includes
the current affine transformation from user coordinates to device coordinates. It also in-
cludes such modal drawing attributes as graphics cursor position, pen color, line type, line
thickness, fill color, and the font used for drawing text. The state of any uncompleted
path (if any) is included as well, since paths may be drawn incrementally, one portion (line
segment, arc, or Bezier curve) at a time.
Warning: Much as in Postscript, the current graphics context may be pushed onto the
stack by calling savestate, and popped off by calling restorestate. However, libplot’s
and Postscript’s drawing models are significantly different. In libplot, the new graph-
ics context created by savestate contains no path. So a new path may be constructed
in it from scratch, and drawn. Afterwards, the path in the former graphics context will
be returned to when restorestate is called, at which time it may be extended further.
Another difference from Postscript is that in libplot, there is no need to start a new path
by calling a ‘newpath’ function. Instead, you just start drawing. At least in theory, you
do need to end a path explicitly, by calling endpath to request that it be drawn on the
graphics display. But the call to endpath can usually be omitted. For example, calling
restorestate automatically invokes endpath to end the path (if any) contained in the
current graphics context.
To permit vector graphics animation, any page of graphics may be split into ‘frames’.
A frame is ended, and a new frame is begun, by invoking the erase operation. This first
terminates the path under construction, if any. What then happens depends on whether the
Plotter does real-time plotting. If it does (i.e., if the Plotter is an X, X Drawable, ReGIS,
Tektronix, or Metafile Plotter), erase removes all plotted objects from the graphics display,
allowing a new frame to be drawn. Displaying a sequence of frames in succession creates
the illusion of smooth animation.
On most Plotters that do not do real-time plotting (i.e., PNG, PNM, SVG, Illustrator,
Postscript, CGM, Fig, PCL, or HP-GL Plotters), invoking erase deletes all plotted objects
from an internal buffer. For this reason, most Plotters that do not do real-time plotting
will display only the final frame of any multiframe page.
GIF Plotters are in a class by themselves. Even though they do not do real time plotting,
a GIF Plotter can produce multi-image output, i.e., an animated pseudo-GIF file, from a
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 94

multiframe page. As noted above, the pseudo-GIF file produced by a GIF Plotter will
contain only the first page of graphics. But if this page consists of multiple frames, then
each invocation of erase after the first will be treated, by default, as a separator between
successive images.

9.2 C Programming with libplot

9.2.1 The C application programming interface
GNU libplot has bindings for several programming languages. Regardless of which bind-
ing is used, the concepts behind libplot (Plotters, and a fixed set of operations that may
be applied to any Plotter) remain the same. However, the ways in which Plotters are ma-
nipulated (created, selected for use, and deleted) may differ between bindings. This section
discusses the current C binding. For information on older C bindings, see Section 9.2.2
[Older C APIs], page 95.
In the C binding, a Plotter is implemented as an opaque datatype, plPlotter, which
must be accessed through a pointer. Each drawing operation takes a pointer to a plPlotter
as its first argument. The functions pl_newpl_r and pl_deletepl_r are the constructor
and destructor for the plPlotter datatype. The final argument of pl_newpl_r must be
a pointer to a plPlotterParams object, which specifies Plotter parameters. pl_newpl_r
returns a pointer to a plPlotter.
You should always call pl_deletepl_r when you are finished using a Plotter. In general,
Plotters that do not plot graphics in real time (Postscript Plotters and CGM Plotters in
particular) write out graphics only when pl_deletepl_r is called.
The following tables summarize the action of the Plotter manipulation functions in the
C binding.
plPlotter * pl_newpl_r (const char *type, FILE *infile, FILE *outfile, FILE *errfile,
plPlotterParams *params);
Create a Plotter of type type, where type may be "X", "Xdrawable", "png",
"pnm", "gif", "svg", "ai", "ps", "cgm", "fig", "pcl", "hpgl", "regis", "tek",
or "meta". The Plotter will have input stream infile, output stream outfile,
and error stream errfile. Any or all of these three may be NULL. Currently, all
Plotters are write-only, so infile is ignored. X Plotters and X Drawable Plotters
write graphics to an X Window System display rather than to an output stream,
so if type is "X" or "Xdrawable" then outfile is ignored as well. Error messages
(if any) are written to the stream errfile, unless errfile is NULL.
All Plotter parameters will be copied from the plPlotterParams object pointed
to by params. A NULL return value indicates the Plotter could not be created.
int pl_deletepl_r (plPlotter *plotter);
Delete the specified Plotter. A negative return value indicates the Plotter could
not be deleted.
The functions pl_newplparams, pl_deleteplparams, and pl_copyplparams are the
constructor, destructor, and copy constructor for the plPlotterParams datatype. The
function pl_setplparam sets any single Plotter parameter in a plPlotterParams object.
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 95

plPlotterParams * pl_newplparams ();

int pl_deleteplparams (plPlotterParams *plotter params);
plPlotterParams * pl_copyplparams (const plPlotterParams *params);
int pl_setplparam (plPlotterParams *params, const char *parameter, void *value);
Set the value of the parameter parameter to value in the object pointed to by
params. For most parameters, value should be a char *, i.e., a string. If value
is NULL, the parameter is unset.
For a list of recognized parameters and their meaning, see Section 9.5 [Plotter
Parameters], page 136. Unrecognized parameters are ignored.
The reason why the plPlotterParams datatype exists is that even though the Plotter
interface is largely Plotter-independent, it is useful to be able to specify certain aspects
of a Plotter’s behavior at creation time. If a a parameter has been set in the specified
plPlotterParams object, that will be the value used by the Plotter. If a parameter is not
set, the Plotter will use a default value for it, unless the parameter is string-valued and there
is an environment variable of the same name, in which case the value of that environment
variable will be used. This rule increases run-time flexibility: an application programmer
may allow non-critical Plotter parameters to be specified by the user via environment vari-
ables.
In the C binding, each drawing operation that may be invoked on a Plotter is represented
by a function whose name begins with "pl " and ends with " r". For example, the openpl
operation is invoked on a Plotter by calling the function pl_openpl_r, the first argument
of which is a pointer to the corresponding plPlotter object.

9.2.2 Older C application programming interfaces

The current C API (application programming interface), which is thread-safe, is a revision
of an older API that is not thread-safe. That is why most functions in the current API
have names that end in " r", which stands for ‘revised’ or ‘reentrant’.
In the old C API, the Plotter on which an operation was performed is not specified as
an argument of the function that was called to perform the operation. Instead, a Plotter is
first ‘selected’. Then the API function is called. pl_openpl was one such function; it opens
the currently selected Plotter, i.e., begins a page of graphics.
The old API is deprecated, but is still supported. The four functions in the old API
that perform Plotter manipulation have the following semantics.
int pl_newpl (const char *type, FILE *infile, FILE *outfile, FILE *errfile);
Create a Plotter of type type, where type may be "X", "Xdrawable", "png",
"pnm", "gif", "svg", "ai", "ps", "fig", "pcl", "hpgl", "regis", "tek", or "meta".
The Plotter will have input stream infile, output stream outfile, and error stream
errfile. The return value is a ‘handle’: a nonnegative integer by which the newly
created Plotter is referred to. A negative return value indicates the Plotter
could not be created.
int pl_selectpl (int handle);
Select a Plotter, referred to by its handle, for use. Only one Plotter may be
selected at a time. A negative return value indicates the specified Plotter could
not be selected. Otherwise, the return value is the handle of the previously
selected Plotter.
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 96

At startup, a single Metafile Plotter that writes to standard output (with

handle ‘0’) is automatically created and selected.
int pl_deletepl (int handle);
Delete a Plotter, specified by its handle. The Plotter must not be selected at
the time it is deleted. A negative return value indicates the Plotter could not
be deleted.
int pl_parampl (const char *parameter, void *value);
Set the global value of the Plotter parameter parameter to value. The parameter
values in effect at the time any Plotter is created will be copied into it.
In the old API, selecting a Plotter with pl_selectpl and setting a value for a Plotter
parameter with pl_parampl are global operations. That is why the old API is not thread-
safe.
An even older C API omitted the prefix "pl " from the names of libplot functions.
The prefix "pl " was added in part to distinguish GNU libplot from pre-GNU versions
of libplot. If you need to compile code written for very early versions of GNU libplot
or for pre-GNU libplot, you should include the header file plotcompat.h. plotcompat.h
redefines openpl as pl_openpl, and so forth. See Section 9.2.3 [C Compiling and Linking],
page 96.

9.2.3 C compiling and linking

The source code for a graphics application written in C, if it is to use the GNU libplot
C API (C application programming interface), must contain the lines
#include <stdio.h>
#include <plot.h>
The header file ‘plot.h’ is distributed with libplot, and should have been installed on
your system where your C compiler will find it. It contains a prototype for each of the
functions in the C API, and some miscellaneous definitions.
To each Plotter operation there corresponds a function in the C API whose name begins
with "pl " and ends with " r". To invoke the Plotter operation, this function would be
called. For example, the openpl operation would be invoked on a Plotter by calling the
function pl_openpl_r, the first argument of which is a pointer to the Plotter. All such
functions are declared in ‘plot.h’.
In releases of GNU libplot before libplot 3.0, Plotter operations were performed in
a different way. For example, there was a function pl_openpl that operated on a Plotter
that was ‘selected’, rather than specified as an argument. The old C API is still supported
by ‘plot.h’. For more information on it, see Section 9.2.2 [Older C APIs], page 95.
In even older releases of GNU libplot, and in the non-GNU versions of libplot that
preceded it, the "pl " prefix was not used. If you need to compile code written for early
versions of GNU libplot or for non-GNU libplot, you should also include the header file
plotcompat.h. That file redefines openpl as pl_openpl, and so forth.
To link your application with GNU libplot, you would use the appropriate ‘-l’ option(s)
on the command line when compiling it. You would use
-lplot -lXaw -lXmu -lXt -lXext -lX11 -lpng -lz -lm
or, in recent releases of the X Window System,
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 97

-lplot -lXaw -lXmu -lXt -lSM -lICE -lXext -lX11 -lpng -lz -lm
These linking options assume that your version of libplot has been compiled with PNG
support; if not, you would omit the ‘-lpng -lz’ options.
As an alternative to the preceding, you may need to use ‘-lplot -lXm -lXt -lXext
-lX11 -lpng -lz -lm’, ‘-lplot -lXm -lXt -lXext -lX11 -lpng -lz -lm -lc -lgen’, or
‘-lplot -lXm -lXt -lXext -lX11 -lpng -lz -lm -lc -lPW’, on systems that provide
Motif widgets instead of Athena widgets. In recent releases of the X Window System, you
would insert ‘-lSM -lICE’. Recent releases of Motif require ‘-lXp’ and possibly ‘-lXpm’
as well.)
On some platforms, the directories in which libplot or the other libraries are stored
must be specified on the command line. For example, the options ‘-lXaw -lXmu -lXt -lSM
-lICE -lXext -lX11’, which specify X Window System libraries, may need to be preceded
by an option like ‘-L/usr/X11/lib’.
On most systems libplot is installed as a shared library. This means that the linking
with your application will take place at run time rather than compile time. The environment
variable LD_LIBRARY_PATH lists the directories which will be searched for shared libraries at
run time. For your application to be executable, this environment variable should include
the directory in which libplot is stored.

9.2.4 Sample drawings in C

The following is a sample application, written in C, that invokes GNU libplot operations
to draw vector graphics. It draws an intricate and beautiful path (Bill Gosper’s “C” curve,
discussed as Item #135 in HAKMEM, MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory Memo #239,
1972). As the numeric constant MAXORDER (here equal to 12) is increased, the path will
take on the shape of a curly letter “C”, which is the envelope of a myriad of epicyclic
octagons.
#include <stdio.h>
#include <plot.h>
#define MAXORDER 12

void draw_c_curve (plPlotter *plotter, double dx, double dy, int order)
{
if (order >= MAXORDER)
/* continue path along (dx, dy) */
pl_fcontrel_r (plotter, dx, dy);
else
{
draw_c_curve (plotter,
0.5 * (dx - dy), 0.5 * (dx + dy), order + 1);
draw_c_curve (plotter,
0.5 * (dx + dy), 0.5 * (dy - dx), order + 1);
}
}
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 98

int main ()
{
plPlotter *plotter;
plPlotterParams *plotter_params;

/* set a Plotter parameter */

plotter_params = pl_newplparams ();
pl_setplparam (plotter_params, "PAGESIZE", "letter");

/* create a Postscript Plotter that writes to standard output */

if ((plotter = pl_newpl_r ("ps", stdin, stdout, stderr,
plotter_params)) == NULL)
{
fprintf (stderr, "Couldn’t create Plotter\n");
return 1;
}

if (pl_openpl_r (plotter) < 0) /* open Plotter */

{
fprintf (stderr, "Couldn’t open Plotter\n");
return 1;
}
pl_fspace_r (plotter, 0.0, 0.0, 1000.0, 1000.0); /* set coor system */
pl_flinewidth_r (plotter, 0.25); /* set line thickness */
pl_pencolorname_r (plotter, "red"); /* use red pen */
pl_erase_r (plotter); /* erase graphics display */
pl_fmove_r (plotter, 600.0, 300.0); /* position the graphics cursor */
draw_c_curve (plotter, 0.0, 400.0, 0);
if (pl_closepl_r (plotter) < 0) /* close Plotter */
{
fprintf (stderr, "Couldn’t close Plotter\n");
return 1;
}

if (pl_deletepl_r (plotter) < 0) /* delete Plotter */

{
fprintf (stderr, "Couldn’t delete Plotter\n");
return 1;
}
return 0;
}

As you can see, this application begins by creating a plPlotterParams object to hold
Plotter parameters, and sets the PAGESIZE parameter. It then calls the pl_newpl_r function
to create a Postscript Plotter. The Postscript Plotter will produce output for a US letter-
sized page, though any other standard page size, e.g., "a4", could be substituted. This
would be arranged by altering the call to pl_setplparam. The PAGESIZE parameter is
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 99

one of several Plotter parameters that an application programmer may set. For a list, see
Section 9.5 [Plotter Parameters], page 136.

After the Plotter is created, the application opens it and draws the “C” curve recursively.
The drawing of the curve is accomplished by calling the pl_fmove_r function to position the
Plotter’s graphics cursor, and then calling draw_c_curve. This subroutine repeatedly calls
pl_fcontrel_r. The pl_fcontrel_r function continues a path by adding a line segment
to it. The endpoint of each line segment is specified in relative floating point coordinates,
i.e., as a floating point offset from the previous cursor position. After the “C” curve is drawn,
the Plotter is closed by calling pl_closepl_r, which automatically invokes pl_endpath_r
to end the path. A Postscript file is written to standard output when pl_deletepl_r is
called to delete the Plotter.

Specifying "png", "pnm", "gif", "svg", "ai", "cgm", "fig", "pcl", "hpgl", "regis", "tek",
or "meta" as the first argument in the call to pl_newpl_r, instead of "ps", would yield a
Plotter that would write graphics to standard output in the specified format, instead of
Postscript. The PAGESIZE parameter is relevant to the "svg", "ai", "cgm", "fig", "pcl",
and "hpgl" output formats, but is ignored for the others. Specifying "meta" as the Plotter
type may be useful if you wish to avoid recompilation for different output devices. Graphics
metafile output may be piped to the plot utility and converted to any other supported
output format, or displayed in an X window. See Chapter 3 [plot], page 30.

If "X" were specified as the first argument of pl_newpl_r, the curve would be drawn
in a popped-up X window, and the output stream argument would be ignored. Which
X Window System display the window would pop up on would be determined by the
DISPLAY parameter, or if that parameter were not set, by the DISPLAY environment vari-
able. The size of the X window would be determined by the BITMAPSIZE parameter, or
if that parameter were not set, by the BITMAPSIZE environment variable. The default
value is "570x570". For the "png", "pnm", and "gif" Plotter types, the interpretation of
BITMAPSIZE is similar.

You could also specify "Xdrawable" as the Plotter type. For you to make this work,
you would need to know a bit about X Window System programming. You would need to
create at least one X drawable (i.e., window or a pixmap), and by invoking pl_setplparam
before pl_newpl_r is called, set it as the value of the parameter XDRAWABLE_DRAWABLE1 or
XDRAWABLE_DRAWABLE2. For the parameters that affect X Drawable Plotters, see Section 9.5
[Plotter Parameters], page 136.

The following is another sample application, written in C, that invokes libplot opera-
tions to draw vector graphics. It draws a spiral consisting of elliptically boxed text strings,
each of which reads "GNU libplot!". This figure will be sent to standard output in Postscript
format.

#include <stdio.h>
#include <plot.h>
#include <math.h>
#define SIZE 100.0 /* nominal size of user coordinate frame */
#define EXPAND 2.2 /* expansion factor for elliptical box */
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 100

void draw_boxed_string (plPlotter *plotter,

char *s, double size, double angle)
{
double true_size, width;

pl_ftextangle_r (plotter, angle); /* set text angle (degrees) */

true_size = pl_ffontsize_r (plotter, size); /* set font size */
width = pl_flabelwidth_r (plotter, s); /* compute width of string */
pl_fellipserel_r (plotter, 0.0, 0.0,
EXPAND * 0.5 * width, EXPAND * 0.5 * true_size,
angle); /* draw surrounding ellipse */
pl_alabel_r (plotter, ’c’, ’c’, s); /* draw centered text string */
}

int main()
{
plPlotter *plotter;
plPlotterParams *plotter_params;
int i;

/* set a Plotter parameter */

plotter_params = pl_newplparams ();
pl_setplparam (plotter_params, "PAGESIZE", "letter");

/* create a Postscript Plotter that writes to standard output */

if ((plotter = pl_newpl_r ("ps", stdin, stdout, stderr,
plotter_params)) == NULL)
{
fprintf (stderr, "Couldn’t create Plotter\n");
return 1;
}

if (pl_openpl_r (plotter) < 0) /* open Plotter */

{
fprintf (stderr, "Couldn’t open Plotter\n");
return 1;
}
/* specify user coor system */
pl_fspace_r (plotter, -(SIZE), -(SIZE), SIZE, SIZE);
pl_pencolorname_r (plotter, "blue"); /* use blue pen */
pl_fillcolorname_r (plotter, "white"); /* set white fill color */
pl_filltype_r (plotter, 1); /* fill ellipses with fill color */
/* choose a Postscript font */
pl_fontname_r (plotter, "NewCenturySchlbk-Roman");
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 101

for (i = 80; i > 1; i--) /* loop through angles */

{
double theta, radius;

theta = 0.5 * (double)i; /* theta is in radians */

radius = SIZE / pow (theta, 0.35); /* this yields a spiral */
pl_fmove_r (plotter, radius * cos (theta), radius * sin (theta));
draw_boxed_string (plotter, "GNU libplot!", 0.04 * radius,
(180.0 * theta / M_PI) - 90.0);
}

if (pl_closepl_r (plotter) < 0) /* close Plotter */

{
fprintf (stderr, "Couldn’t close Plotter\n");
return 1;
}
if (pl_deletepl_r (plotter) < 0) /* delete Plotter */
{
fprintf (stderr, "Couldn’t delete Plotter\n");
return 1;
}
return 0;
}
This example shows what is involved in plotting a text string or text strings. First,
the desired font must be retrieved. A font is fully specified by calling pl_fontname_r, pl_
fontsize_r, and pl_textangle_r, or their floating point counterparts pl_ffontname_r,
pl_ffontsize_r, and pl_ftextangle_r. Since these three functions may be called in any
order, each of them returns the size of the font that it selects, as a convenience to the
programmer. This may differ slightly from the size specified in the most recent call to
pl_fontsize_r or pl_ffontsize_r, since many Plotters have only a limited repertory of
fonts. The above example plots each text string in the "NewCenturySchlbk-Roman" font,
which is available on Postscript Plotters. See Section A.1 [Text Fonts], page 144.
If you replace "ps" by "X" in the call to pl_newpl_r, an X Plotter rather than a Post-
script Plotter will be used, and the spiral will be drawn in a popped-up X window. If your
X display does not support the "NewCenturySchlbk-Roman" font, you may substitute any
core X font, such as the widely available scalable font "charter-medium-r-normal", or the
traditional screen font "fixed". For the format of font names, see Section A.3 [Text Fonts in
X], page 150. If the X Plotter is unable to retrieve the font you specify, it will first attempt
to use a default scalable font ("Helvetica", interpreted in the context of the X Window
System as "helvetica-medium-r-normal"), and if that fails, use a default Hershey vector
font ("HersheySerif") instead. Hershey fonts are constructed from line segments, so each
built-in Hershey font is available on all types of Plotter.
If you are using an ancient (pre-X11R6) X Window System display, you will find that
retrieving a font is a time-consuming operation. The above example may run slowly on
such displays, since a new font must be retrieved before each text string is drawn. That
is because each text string has a different angle of inclination. It is possible to retrieve
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 102

individual characters from an X11R6 display, rather than retrieving an entire font. If this
feature is available, the X Plotter will automatically take advantage of it to save time.

9.2.5 Simple paths and compound paths

The most sophisticated sort of graphical object that libplot can draw is a path. In this
section we explain the fine details of constructing paths. The other three sorts of graphical
object (text strings, marker symbols, and points [i.e., pixels]) are discussed elsewhere.
As in Postscript, paths may be simple or compound. A simple path is a contiguous
sequence of line segments, circular arcs, elliptic arcs, quadratic Bezier curves, and/or cubic
Bezier curves. A simple path may also be a circle, an ellipse, or a rectangle. A compound
path consists of one or more simple paths, which must be nested : they should not intersect
each other. This is more restrictive than in Postscript.
libplot’s drawing model is significantly different from Postscript’s, and is more user-
friendly. Before drawing a path by invoking libplot operations, you do not need to call
any special function. You would specify the attributes of the path before drawing, however.
Attributes include pen color, line type, line width, cap type, join type, and miter limit.
If the path is to be filled, the fill color and fill rule would be specified too. All these
attributes are ‘modal’: their values are preserved from path to path.
In principle, you would end any path you construct, and request that it be drawn on the
graphics display, by invoking the endpath operation. But endpath is called automatically
when any path-related attribute is changed, when move is called to change the graphics
cursor position, and before any other object is constructed and drawn. It is also called
at the end of each page of graphics, i.e., when closepl is invoked. So invoking endpath
explicitly is usually unnecessary. This is quite different from Postscript, where an explicit
command to stroke or fill a path is required.
libplot also differs from Postscript in the way it constructs and draws compound paths.
In libplot, you would end each of the constituent simple paths of a compound path by
invoking the endsubpath operation. After all simple paths are drawn, the compound path
as a whole would be drawn by invoking endpath. After each of the calls to endsubpath, you
are allowed to call move to reposition the graphics cursor, prior to beginning the next simple
path. Immediately after an invocation of endsubpath, a call to move will not automatically
invoke endpath.
The following sample program uses a Postscript Plotter to produce Postscript output.
It draws a typical compound path, which consists of 17 simple paths. The first simple path
is a large box. This box contains 7 circles, nested within each other, and a separate set
of 7 circles that are also nested within each other. Within each of the two sets of nested
circles is a pair of contiguous line segments, which make up an additional simple path. The
compound path is drawn in green, and it is filled. The fill color is light blue.
#include <stdio.h>
#include <plot.h>

int main ()
{
int i, j;
plPlotter *plotter;
plPlotterParams *plotter_params;
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 103

/* set a Plotter parameter */

plotter_params = pl_newplparams ();
pl_setplparam (plotter_params, "PAGESIZE", "letter");
/* create a Postscript Plotter that writes to standard output */
plotter = pl_newpl_r ("ps", stdin, stdout, stderr, plotter_params);
/* open Plotter, i.e. begin a page of graphics */
pl_openpl_r (plotter);

pl_fspace_r (plotter, 0.0, 0.0, 1000.0, 1000.0); /* set coor system */

pl_flinewidth_r (plotter, 5.0); /* set line thickness */
pl_pencolorname_r (plotter, "green");
pl_fillcolorname_r (plotter, "light blue");
pl_filltype_r (plotter, 1); /* do filling, full strength */
pl_erase_r (plotter); /* erase graphics display */

/* draw a compound path consisting of 17 simple paths */

/* draw the first simple path: a large box */

pl_orientation_r (plotter, 1);
pl_fbox_r (plotter, 50.0, 50.0, 950.0, 950.0);
pl_endsubpath_r (plotter);
for (i = 0; i < 2; i++)
/* draw 8 simple paths that are nested inside the box */
{
/* first, draw 7 simple paths: nested circles */
for (j = 9; j >= 3; j--)
{
pl_orientation_r (plotter, j % 2 ? -1 : 1);
pl_fcircle_r (plotter, 250.0 + 500 * i, 500.0, j * 20.0);
pl_endsubpath_r (plotter);
}
/* draw an open simple path comprising two line segments */
pl_fmove_r (plotter, 225.0 + 500 * i, 475.0);
pl_fcont_r (plotter, 250.0 + 500 * i, 525.0);
pl_fcont_r (plotter, 275.0 + 500 * i, 475.0);
pl_endsubpath_r (plotter);
}
/* formally end the compound path (not actually necessary) */
pl_endpath_r (plotter);

/* close Plotter, i.e. end page of graphics */

pl_closepl_r (plotter);
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 104

/* delete Plotter */
if (pl_deletepl_r (plotter) < 0)
{
fprintf (stderr, "Couldn’t delete Plotter\n");
return 1;
}
return 0;
}
As you will see if you run this program, the filling of the compound path takes place in
a visually pleasing way: alternating annular regions are filled. That is because libplot’s
default fill rule is "even-odd". Since a compound path’s constituent simple paths must
always be nested, it is easy for libplot to determine which regions between them are
‘even’ and which are ‘odd’. It is the latter that are filled.
The above program includes many invocations of orientation. The value of the modal
‘orientation’ attribute (1, meaning counterclockwise, or −1, meaning clockwise) applies to
subsequently drawn boxes, circles, and ellipses. If "even-odd" filling is used, they have no
effect. But if the fill rule for the compound path is set to "nonzero-winding" by an initial
call to fillmod, these calls to orientation will arrange matters so that alternating annular
regions are filled, just as if "even-odd" filling were used.
If the preceding paragraph is mysterious, it would be wise to consult a good book on
Postscript programming, or any other reference on the subject of ‘winding numbers’.

9.2.6 Drawing on a physical page

GNU libplot can draw graphics over an entire page of paper, not merely within the
graphics display or ‘viewport’ that it normally uses.
The default viewport used by an Illustrator, Postscript, Fig, or PCL Plotter is a square
region centered on the page. The size of the default viewport depends on the PAGESIZE
parameter, which may be "letter", "a4", etc. See Appendix C [Page and Viewport Sizes],
page 167. For example, the default viewport on a letter-sized page, which has width 8.5 in
and height 11 in, is a square of side 8 in.
However, you may specify different dimensions for the viewport, and a different
position as well. In particular, you may specify a viewport that covers the entire
page. This would be accomplished by setting PAGESIZE to, for example, "let-
ter,xsize=8.5in,ysize=11in,xorigin=0in,yorigin=0in". "xorigin" and "yorigin" specify the
location of the lower left corner of the viewport, relative to the lower left corner of the
page.
With this choice for the viewport, the entire page is in principle imageable. For full-page
drawing, it is convenient to define a user coordinate system in terms of which the lower left
corner of the page is (0,0), and in which the units are physical inches or centimeters. To do
so, you would use appropriate arguments when invoking the space operation on the Plotter.
The following program shows how the space operation would be invoked.
#include <stdio.h>
#include <plot.h>
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 105

int main()
{
plPlotter *plotter;
plPlotterParams *plotter_params;

/* set page size parameter, including viewport size and location */

plotter_params = pl_newplparams ();
pl_setplparam (plotter_params, "PAGESIZE",
"letter,xsize=8.5in,ysize=11in,xorigin=0in,yorigin=0in");

/* create a Postscript Plotter with the specified parameter */

plotter = pl_newpl_r ("ps", stdin, stdout, stderr, plotter_params);

pl_openpl_r (plotter); /* begin page of graphics */

pl_fspace_r (plotter,
0.0, 0.0, 8.5, 11.0); /* set user coor system */

pl_fontname_r (plotter, "Times-Bold");

pl_ffontsize_r (plotter, 0.5); /* font size = 0.5in = 36pt */

pl_fmove_r (plotter, 1.0, 10.0);

pl_alabel_r (plotter, ’l’, ’x’, "One inch below the top");
pl_fline_r (plotter, 1.0, 10.0, 7.5, 10.0);

pl_fmove_r (plotter, 7.5, 1.0);

pl_alabel_r (plotter, ’r’, ’x’, "One inch above the bottom");
pl_fline_r (plotter, 1.0, 1.0, 7.5, 1.0);

pl_closepl_r (plotter); /* end page of graphics */

pl_deletepl_r (plotter); /* delete Plotter */
return 0;
}

The program will print two strings and draw the baseline for each. The first string will be
left-justified at position (1.0,11.0), which is one inch below the top of the page. The second
string will be right-justified at position (7.5,1.0), which is one inch above the bottom of the
page. For both strings, the ’x’ argument of pl_alabel_r specifies the vertical positioning:
it requests that the baseline of the string, rather than (say) its top or bottom, be positioned
at the current vertical position.

The preceding discussion and sample program dealt with the portrait orientation of the
printed page, which is the default. Drawing in landscape orientation is only slightly more
complicated. For this, the viewport would be rotated on the page by setting the Plotter
parameter ROTATION. Its default value is "0" (or "no"), but any other rotation angle may
be specified. To obtain landscape orientation, one would specify "90" (for historical reasons,
"yes" is equivalent to "90"). The following program is a modified version of the preceding,
showing how a landscape orientation would be produced.
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 106

#include <stdio.h>
#include <plot.h>

int main()
{
plPlotter *plotter;
plPlotterParams *plotter_params;

/* set Plotter parameters */

plotter_params = pl_newplparams ();
pl_setplparam (plotter_params, "PAGESIZE",
"letter,xsize=8.5in,ysize=11in,xorigin=0in,yorigin=0in");
pl_setplparam (plotter_params, "ROTATION", "90");

/* create a Postscript Plotter with the specified parameters */

plotter = pl_newpl_r ("ps", stdin, stdout, stderr, plotter_params);

pl_openpl_r (plotter); /* begin page of graphics */

pl_fspace_r (plotter,
0.0, 0.0, 11.0, 8.5); /* set user coor system */

pl_fontname_r (plotter, "Times-Bold");

pl_ffontsize_r (plotter, 0.5); /* font size = 0.5in = 36pt */

pl_fmove_r (plotter, 1.0, 7.5);

pl_alabel_r (plotter, ’l’, ’x’, "One inch below the top");
pl_fline_r (plotter, 1.0, 7.5, 10.0, 7.5);

pl_fmove_r (plotter, 10.0, 1.0);

pl_alabel_r (plotter, ’r’, ’x’, "One inch above the bottom");
pl_fline_r (plotter, 1.0, 1.0, 10.0, 1.0);

pl_closepl_r (plotter); /* end page of graphics */

pl_deletepl_r (plotter); /* delete Plotter */
return 0;
}
In this example the viewport is the same centered 8 in by 8 in square, but it is rotated
by 90 degrees counterclockwise; or equivalently, the graphics within it are rotated. As in
the preceding example, the call to pl_fspace_r sets up the user coordinate system so that
the units are physical inches. The origin of coordinates is now the lower right corner of the
page. The x and y coordinates increase upward and to the left, respectively.

9.2.7 Animated GIFs in C

Using GNU libplot to create pseudo-GIF files, including animated pseudo-GIFs, is
straightforward. A GIF Plotter is a Plotter like any other, and it supports the same
drawing operations. However, it has two special properties. (1) It can draw only a single
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 107

page of graphics, i.e., only the graphics contained in the first openpl. . . closepl pair
appear in the output file. In this, it resembles other Plotters that do not plot in real time.
(2) Within this page, each invocation of erase is normally treated as the beginning of a
new image in the output file. There is an exception to this: the first invocation of erase
begins a new image only if something has already been drawn.
The reason for the exception is that many programmers who use libplot are in the
habit of invoking erase immediately after a Plotter is opened. That is not a bad habit,
since a few types of Plotter (e.g., X Drawable and Tektronix Plotters) are ‘persistent’ in
the sense that previously drawn graphics remain visible.
The following program creates a simple animated pseudo-GIF, 150 pixels wide and 100
pixels high.
#include <stdio.h>
#include <plot.h>

int main()
{
plPlotter *plotter;
plPlotterParams *plotter_params;
int i;

/* set Plotter parameters */

plotter_params = pl_newplparams ();
pl_setplparam (plotter_params, "BITMAPSIZE", "150x100");
pl_setplparam (plotter_params, "BG_COLOR", "orange");
pl_setplparam (plotter_params, "TRANSPARENT_COLOR", "orange");
pl_setplparam (plotter_params, "GIF_ITERATIONS", "100");
pl_setplparam (plotter_params, "GIF_DELAY", "5");

/* create a GIF Plotter with the specified parameters */

plotter = pl_newpl_r ("gif", stdin, stdout, stderr, plotter_params);

pl_openpl_r (plotter); /* begin page of graphics */

pl_fspace_r (plotter,
-0.5, -0.5, 149.5, 99.5); /* set user coor system */

pl_pencolorname_r (plotter, "red"); /* use red pen */

pl_linewidth_r (plotter, 5); /* set line thickness */
pl_filltype_r (plotter, 1); /* objects will be filled */
pl_fillcolorname_r (plotter, "black"); /* set the fill color */

for (i = 0; i < 180 ; i += 15)

{
pl_erase_r (plotter); /* begin new GIF image */
pl_ellipse_r (plotter, 75, 50, 40, 20, i); /* draw an ellipse */
}
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 108

pl_closepl_r (plotter); /* end page of graphics */

pl_deletepl_r (plotter); /* delete Plotter */
return 0;
}

The animated pseudo-GIF will be written to standard output. It will consist of twelve
images, showing the counterclockwise rotation of a black-filled red ellipse through 180 de-
grees. The pseudo-GIF will be ‘looped’ (see below), so the ellipse will rotate repeatedly.

The parameters of the ellipse are expressed in terms of user coordinates, not pixel coor-
dinates. But the call to pl_fspace_r defines user coordinates that are effectively the same
as pixel coordinates. In the user coordinate system, the lower left corner of the rectangle
mapped into the 150x100 pseudo-GIF image is given coordinates (−0.5,−0.5), and the up-
per right corner is given coordinates (149.5,99.5). So individual pixels may be addressed in
terms of integer user coordinates. For example, invoking pl_point_r(plotter,0,0) and
pl_point_r(plotter,149,99) would set the pixels in the lower left and upper right corners
of the image to the current pen color.

Besides BITMAPSIZE and BG_COLOR, there are several important GIF Plotter parameters
that may be set with the pl_setplparam function. The TRANSPARENT_COLOR parameter may
be set to the name of a color. Pixels in a pseudo-GIF that have that color will be treated
as transparent by most software. This is usually used to create a transparent background.
In the example above, the background color is specified as orange, but the transparent color
is also specified as orange. So the background will not actually be displayed.

The GIF_ITERATIONS parameter, if set, specifies the number of times that a multi-frame
pseudo-GIF should be looped. The GIF_DELAY parameter specifies the number of hun-
dredths of a seconds that should elapse between successive images.

The INTERLACE parameter is sometimes useful. If it is set to "yes", the pseudo-GIF will
be interlaced. This is of greatest value for single-frame GIFs. For full details on Plotter
parameters, see Section 9.5 [Plotter Parameters], page 136.

9.2.8 X Window System animations in C

You may use GNU libplot to produce vector graphics animations on any Plotter that
does real-time plotting (i.e., an X, X Drawable, ReGIS, Tektronix, or Metafile Plotter).
By definition, the ‘frames’ in any page of graphics are separated by invocations of erase.
So the graphics display will be cleared after each frame. If successive frames differ only
slightly, a smooth animation will result.

The following is a sample application, written in C, that produces an animation for the
X Window System. It displays a ‘drifting eye’. As the eye drifts across a popped-up window
from left to right, it slowly rotates. After the eye has drifted across twice, the window will
vanish.

#include <stdio.h>
#include <plot.h>
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 109

int main ()
{
plPlotter *plotter;
plPlotterParams *plotter_params;
int i = 0, j;

/* set Plotter parameters */

plotter_params = pl_newplparams ();
pl_setplparam (plotter_params, "BITMAPSIZE", "300x150");
pl_setplparam (plotter_params, "VANISH_ON_DELETE", "yes");
pl_setplparam (plotter_params, "USE_DOUBLE_BUFFERING", "yes");

/* create an X Plotter with the specified parameters */

if ((plotter = pl_newpl_r ("X", stdin, stdout, stderr,
plotter_params)) == NULL)
{
fprintf (stderr, "Couldn’t create Plotter\n");
return 1;
}

if (pl_openpl_r (plotter) < 0) /* open Plotter */

{
fprintf (stderr, "Couldn’t open Plotter\n");
return 1;
}
pl_fspace_r (plotter,
-0.5, -0.5, 299.5, 149.5); /* set user coor system */
pl_linewidth_r (plotter, 8); /* set line thickness */
pl_filltype_r (plotter, 1); /* objects will be filled */
pl_bgcolorname_r (plotter, "saddle brown"); /* set background color */
for (j = 0; j < 300; j++)
{
pl_erase_r (plotter); /* erase window */
pl_pencolorname_r (plotter, "red"); /* use red pen */
pl_fillcolorname_r (plotter, "cyan"); /* use cyan filling */
pl_ellipse_r (plotter, i, 75, 35, 50, i); /* draw an ellipse */
pl_colorname_r (plotter, "black"); /* use black pen and filling */
pl_circle_r (plotter, i, 75, 12); /* draw a circle [the pupil] */
i = (i + 2) % 300; /* shift rightwards */
}
if (pl_closepl_r (plotter) < 0) /* close Plotter */
{
fprintf (stderr, "Couldn’t close Plotter\n");
return 1;
}
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 110

if (pl_deletepl_r (plotter) < 0) /* delete Plotter */

{
fprintf (stderr, "Couldn’t delete Plotter\n");
return 1;
}
return 0;
}

As you can see, this application begins by calling pl_setplparam several times to set
Plotter parameters, and then calls pl_newpl_r to create an X Plotter. The X Plotter
window will have size 300x150 pixels. This window will vanish when the Plotter is deleted.
If the VANISH_ON_DELETE parameter were not set to "yes", the window would remain on
the screen until removed by the user (by typing ‘q’ in it, or by clicking with a mouse).

Setting the parameter USE_DOUBLE_BUFFERING to "yes" requests that double buffering

be used. This is very important if you wish to produce a smooth animation, with no
jerkiness. Normally, an X Plotter draws graphics into a window in real time, and erases the
window when pl_erase_r is called. But if double buffering is used, each frame of graphics
is written into an off-screen buffer, and is copied into the window, pixel by pixel, when
pl_erase_r is called or the Plotter is closed. This is exactly what is needed for smooth
animation.

After the Plotter is created, it is selected for use and opened. When pl_openpl_r is
called, the window pops up, and the animation begins. In the body of the for loop there
is a call to pl_erase_r, and also a sequence of libplot operations that draws the eye.
The pen color and fill color are changed twice with each passage through the loop. You
may wish to experiment with the animation parameters to produce the best effects on your
video hardware.

The positions of the objects that are plotted in the animation are expressed in terms of
user coordinates, not pixel coordinates. But the call to pl_fspace_r defines user and pixel
coordinates to be effectively the same. User coordinates are chosen so that the lower left
corner of the rectangle mapped to the X window is (−0.5,−0.5) and the upper right corner
is (299.5,149.5). Since this agrees with the window size, individual pixels may be addressed
in terms of integer user coordinates. For example, pl_point_r(plotter,299,149) would
set the pixel in the upper right corner of the window to the current pen color.

The following is another sample animation, this time of a rotating letter ‘A’.

#include <stdio.h>
#include <plot.h>
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 111

int main()
{
plPlotter *plotter;
plPlotterParams *plotter_params;
int angle = 0;

/* set Plotter parameters */

plotter_params = pl_newplparams ();
pl_setplparam (plotter_params, "BITMAPSIZE", "300x300");
pl_setplparam (plotter_params, "USE_DOUBLE_BUFFERING", "yes");
pl_setplparam (plotter_params, "BG_COLOR", "blue");

/* create an X Plotter with the specified parameters */

plotter = pl_newpl_r ("X", stdin, stdout, stderr, plotter_params);

/* open X Plotter, initialize coordinates, pen, and font */

pl_openpl_r (plotter);
pl_fspace_r (plotter, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0, 1.0); /* use normalized coors */
pl_pencolorname_r (plotter, "white");
pl_ffontsize_r (plotter, 1.0);
pl_fontname_r (plotter, "NewCenturySchlbk-Roman");

pl_fmove_r (plotter, 0.5, 0.5); /* move to center */

while (1) /* loop endlessly */
{
pl_erase_r (plotter);
pl_textangle_r (plotter, angle++); /* set new rotation angle */
pl_alabel_r (plotter, ’c’, ’c’, "A"); /* draw a centered ‘A’ */
}
pl_closepl_r (plotter); /* close Plotter */

pl_deletepl_r (plotter); /* delete Plotter */

return 0;
}

This animation serves as a good test of the capabilities of an X Window System dis-
play. On a modern X11R6 display, animation will be smooth and fast. That is because
X11R6 displays can retrieve individual characters from a font without retrieving the entire
font. If your X display does not support the "NewCenturySchlbk-Roman" font, you may
substitute most core X fonts, such as the widely available scalable font "charter-medium-r-
normal", or the traditional screen font "fixed". For the format of font names, see Section A.3
[Text Fonts in X], page 150. If the X Plotter is unable to retrieve the font you specify, it will
first attempt to use a default scalable font ("Helvetica", interpreted in the context of the
X Window System as "helvetica-medium-r-normal"). If that too fails, it will use a default
Hershey vector font ("HersheySerif") instead.
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 112

Animations that use Hershey fonts are normally faster than ones that use Postscript
fonts or other X Window System fonts, since the Hershey fonts are constructed from line
segments. Rasterizing line segments can be done rapidly.
If you are writing an application that performs a lengthy sequence of drawing opera-
tions on an X Plotter, you may find it useful to set the Plotter parameter X_AUTO_FLUSH to
"no". By default, an X Plotter flushes all graphics to its X Window System display after
each drawing operation. This flushing ensures that graphics are visible to the user imme-
diately after they are drawn. However, it sometimes slows down the rendering process. For
additional details on Plotter parameters, see Section 9.5 [Plotter Parameters], page 136.

9.2.9 Advanced X Window System programming

Applications that run under the X Window System are often built using Xt, the X Toolkit.
In Xt, an application is constructed from ‘widgets’ such as text entry fields, buttons, sliders,
drawing areas, etc. When the application starts up, each widget is configured to respond
appropriately to ‘events’, which include key presses and mouse clicks. After the widgets are
configured, control is transferred to the Xt event loop.
GNU libplot can be used within the Xt event loop to draw vector graphics. For this, it
would use one or more X Drawable Plotters. An X Drawable Plotter is a Plotter that can
plot into an off-screen pixmap or an on-screen window, such as a window associated with a
widget.
The following sample application shows how an X Drawable Plotter would be used. The
application draws a ‘C’ curve, as defined in a previous section, in a popped-up window.
The usual Xt command-line options may be used: the window background color is specified
with the ‘-bg’ option, the window geometry with ‘-geometry’, etc. The curve is initially
drawn in red, but clicking once with the mouse will redraw it in green. A second mouse
click will redraw it in red, and so forth. The application will terminate when ‘q’ is typed.
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <plot.h>
#include <X11/Xlib.h>
#include <X11/Intrinsic.h>
#include <X11/Shell.h>
#include <X11/StringDefs.h>
#include <X11/Core.h>

plPlotter *plotter;
int green = 0; /* draw in green, not red? */

#define MAXORDER 12
void draw_c_curve (double dx, double dy, int order)
{
if (order >= MAXORDER)
/* continue path along (dx, dy) */
pl_fcontrel_r (plotter, dx, dy);
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 113

else
{
draw_c_curve (0.5 * (dx - dy), 0.5 * (dx + dy), order + 1);
draw_c_curve (0.5 * (dx + dy), 0.5 * (dy - dx), order + 1);
}
}

void Redraw (Widget w, XEvent *ev, String *params, Cardinal *n_params)

{
/* draw C curve */
pl_erase_r (plotter);
pl_pencolorname_r (plotter, green ? "green" : "red");
pl_fmove_r (plotter, 600.0, 300.0);
draw_c_curve (0.0, 400.0, 0);
pl_endpath_r (plotter);
}

void Toggle (Widget w, XEvent *ev, String *params, Cardinal *n_params)

{
green = (green ? 0 : 1);
Redraw (w, ev, params, n_params);
}

void Quit (Widget w, XEvent *ev, String *params, Cardinal *n_params)

{
exit (0);
}

/* mapping of events to actions */

static const String translations =
"<Expose>: redraw()\n\
<Btn1Down>: toggle()\n\
<Key>q: quit()";

/* mapping of actions to subroutines */

static XtActionsRec actions[] =
{
{"redraw", Redraw},
{"toggle", Toggle},
{"quit", Quit},
};
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 114

/* default parameters for widgets */

static String default_resources[] =
{
"Example*geometry: 250x250",
(String)NULL
};

int main (int argc, char *argv[])

{
plPlotterParams *plotter_params;
Arg wargs[10]; /* storage of widget args */
Display *display; /* X display */
Widget shell, canvas; /* toplevel widget; child */
Window window; /* child widget’s window */
XtAppContext app_con; /* application context */
int i;
char *bg_colorname = "white";

/* take background color from command line */

for (i = 0; i < argc - 1; i++)
if (strcmp (argv[i], "-bg") == 0)
bg_colorname = argv[i + 1];
/* create toplevel shell widget */
shell = XtAppInitialize (&app_con,
(String)"Example", /* app class */
NULL, /* options */
(Cardinal)0, /* num of options */
&argc, /* command line */
argv, /* command line */
default_resources,
NULL, /* ArgList */
(Cardinal)0 /* num of Args */
);
/* set default widget parameters (including window size) */
XtAppSetFallbackResources (app_con, default_resources);
/* map actions to subroutines */
XtAppAddActions (app_con, actions, XtNumber (actions));
/* create canvas widget as child of shell widget; realize both */
XtSetArg(wargs[0], XtNargc, argc);
XtSetArg(wargs[1], XtNargv, argv);
canvas = XtCreateManagedWidget ((String)"", coreWidgetClass,
shell, wargs, (Cardinal)2);
XtRealizeWidget (shell);
/* for the canvas widget, map events to actions */
XtSetArg (wargs[0], XtNtranslations,
XtParseTranslationTable (translations));
XtSetValues (canvas, wargs, (Cardinal)1);
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 115

/* initialize GNU libplot */

plotter_params = pl_newplparams ();
display = XtDisplay (canvas);
window = XtWindow (canvas);
pl_setplparam (plotter_params, "XDRAWABLE_DISPLAY", display);
pl_setplparam (plotter_params, "XDRAWABLE_DRAWABLE1", &window);
pl_setplparam (plotter_params, "BG_COLOR", bg_colorname);
plotter = pl_newpl_r ("Xdrawable", NULL, NULL, stderr,
plotter_params);
pl_openpl_r (plotter);
pl_fspace_r (plotter, 0.0, 0.0, 1000.0, 1000.0);
pl_flinewidth_r (plotter, 0.25);

/* transfer control to X Toolkit event loop (doesn’t return) */

XtAppMainLoop (app_con);

return 1;
}
Even if you are not familiar with X Window System programming, the structure of this
application should be clear. It defines three callbacks: Redraw, Toggle, and Quit. They are
invoked respectively in response to (1) a window expose event or mouse click, (2) a mouse
click, and (3) a typed ‘q’. The first drawing of the ‘C’ curve (in red) takes place because
the window receives an initial expose event.
This example could be extended to take window resizing into account. Actually,
X Drawable Plotters are usually used to draw vector graphics in off-screen pixmaps rather
than on-screen windows. Pixmaps, unlike windows, are never resized.

9.3 C++ Programming with libplotter

9.3.1 The Plotter class
The C++ binding for libplot is provided by a class library named libplotter. This li-
brary implements a Plotter class of which all Plotters are instances. Actually, a Plotter
would normally be an instance of an appropriate derived class, determined by the Plot-
ter’s output format. Derived classes include XPlotter, XDrawablePlotter, PNGPlotter,
PNMPlotter, GIFPlotter, AIPlotter, PSPlotter, CGMPlotter, FigPlotter, PCLPlotter,
HPGLPlotter, ReGISPlotter, TekPlotter, and MetaPlotter. The names should be self-
explanatory. The operations that may be applied to any Plotter (e.g., the openpl operation,
which begins a page of graphics) are implemented as public function members of the Plotter
class.
At the time a Plotter is created, its input, output, and error streams must be specified,
along with a PlotterParams object that optionally contains other Plotter parameters. (The
input stream is ignored, since at present, all Plotters are write-only.) The streams may be
specified either as iostreams or as FILE pointers. That is, the two constructors
Plotter(istream& instream, ostream& outstream, ostream& errstream,
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 116

PlotterParams &params);
Plotter(FILE *infile, FILE *outfile, FILE *errfile,
PlotterParams &params);
are provided for the base Plotter class, and similarly for each of its derived classes. So, for
example, both
PSPlotter plotter(cin, cout, cerr, params);
and
PSPlotter plotter(stdin, stdout, stderr, params);
are possible declarations of a Postscript Plotter that writes to standard output. In the
iostream case, an ostream with a null stream buffer may be specified as the output stream
and/or the error stream, to request that no output take place. In the FILE pointer case,
specifying a null FILE pointer would accomplish the same thing. Instances of the XPlotter
and XDrawablePlotter classes always ignore the output stream argument, since they write
graphics to an X Display rather than to a stream.
The PlotterParams class supports copying and assignment, but has only a single public
function member, setplparam. The following is a formal description.
int PlotterParams::setplparam (const char *parameter, void *value);
Set the value of the Plotter parameter parameter to value. For most parameters,
value should be a char *, i.e., a string. Unrecognized parameters are ignored.
For a list of the recognized parameters and their meaning, see Section 9.5 [Plot-
ter Parameters], page 136.
Like the plPlotterParams datatype and the function pl_setplparam of the C binding,
the PlotterParams class and the PlotterParams::setplparam function of the C++ binding
give the programmer fine control over the parameters of subsequently created Plotters. The
parameter values used by any Plotter are constant over the lifetime of the Plotter, and
are those that were specified when the Plotter was created. If at Plotter creation time a
parameter has not been set in the specified PlotterParams object, its default value will
be used, unless the parameter is string-valued and there is an environment variable of the
same name, in which case the value of that environment variable will be used.
Once set in a PlotterParams object, a parameter may be unset by the programmer
by invoking PlotterParams::setplparam with a value argument of NULL. This further
increases flexibility.
There is an alternative (older) way of constructing a Plotter, which is deprecated but
still supported. By using either of
Plotter(istream& instream, ostream& outstream, ostream& errstream);
Plotter(FILE *infile, FILE *outfile, FILE *errfile);
one may construct a Plotter without specifying a PlotterParams object. In this case the
parameter values for the Plotter are copied from static storage. A parameter may be set in
static storage by invoking a static member function of the Plotter class, Plotter::parampl,
which has declaration
int PlotterParams::parampl (const char *parameter, void *value);
This alternative way of creating a Plotter is not thread-safe, which is why it is deprecated.
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 117

9.3.2 C++ compiling and linking

The source code for a graphics application written in C++, if it is to use libplotter, must
contain the line
#include <plotter.h>
The header file plotter.h is distributed with libplotter, and should have been installed
on your system where your C++ compiler will find it. It declares the Plotter class and
its derived classes, and also contains some miscellaneous definitions. It includes the header
files <iostream.h> and <stdio.h>, so you do not need to include them separately.
To link your application with libplotter, you would use the appropriate ‘-l’ option(s)
on the command line when compiling it. You would use
-lplotter -lXaw -lXmu -lXt -lXext -lX11 -lpng -lz -lm
or, in recent releases of the X Window System,
-lplotter -lXaw -lXmu -lXt -lSM -lICE -lXext -lX11 -lpng -lz -lm
These linking options assume that your version of libplotter has been compiled with PNG
support; if not, you would omit the ‘-lpng -lz’ options.
As an alternative to the preceding, you may need to use ‘-lplotter -lXm -lXt
-lXext -lX11 -lpng -lz -lm’, ‘-lplotter -lXm -lXt -lXext -lX11 -lpng -lz -lm -lc
-lgen’, or ‘-lplotter -lXm -lXt -lXext -lX11 -lpng -lz -lm -lc -lPW’, on systems
that provide Motif widgets instead of Athena widgets. In recent releases of the X Window
System, you would insert ‘-lSM -lICE’. Recent releases of Motif require ‘-lXp’ and
possibly ‘-lXpm’ as well.)
On some platforms, the directories in which libplotter or the other libraries are stored
must be specified on the command line. For example, the options ‘-lXaw -lXmu -lXt -lSM
-lICE -lXext -lX11’, which specify X Window System libraries, may need to be preceded
by an option like ‘-L/usr/X11/lib’.
On most systems libplotter is installed as a shared library. This means that the linking
with your application will take place at run time rather than compile time. The environment
variable LD_LIBRARY_PATH lists the directories which will be searched for shared libraries at
run time. For your application to be executable, this environment variable should include
the directory in which libplotter is stored.

9.3.3 Sample drawings in C++

In a previous section, there are several sample C programs that show how to draw vector
graphics using libplot’s C binding. See Section 9.2.4 [Sample C Drawings], page 97. In this
section, we give a modified version of one of the C programs, showing how libplot’s C++
binding, i.e., libplotter, can be used similarly.
The following C++ program draws an intricate and beautiful path (Bill Gosper’s
“C” curve).
#include <plotter.h>
const int maxorder = 12;
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 118

void draw_c_curve (Plotter& plotter, double dx, double dy, int order)
{
if (order >= maxorder)
plotter.fcontrel (dx, dy); // continue path along (dx, dy)
else
{
draw_c_curve (plotter,
0.5 * (dx - dy), 0.5 * (dx + dy), order + 1);
draw_c_curve (plotter,
0.5 * (dx + dy), 0.5 * (dy - dx), order + 1);
}
}

int main ()
{
// set a Plotter parameter
PlotterParams params;
params.setplparam ("PAGESIZE", (char *)"letter");

PSPlotter plotter(cin, cout, cerr, params); // declare Plotter

if (plotter.openpl () < 0) // open Plotter
{
cerr << "Couldn’t open Plotter\n";
return 1;
}

plotter.fspace (0.0, 0.0, 1000.0, 1000.0); // specify user coor system

plotter.flinewidth (0.25); // line thickness in user coordinates
plotter.pencolorname ("red"); // path will be drawn in red
plotter.erase (); // erase Plotter’s graphics display
plotter.fmove (600.0, 300.0); // position the graphics cursor
draw_c_curve (plotter, 0.0, 400.0, 0);
if (plotter.closepl () < 0) // close Plotter
{
cerr << "Couldn’t close Plotter\n";
return 1;
}
return 0;
}

The above is a straightforward translation of the corresponding C program. Here,

plotter is declared as an instance of the PSPlotter class, which will write Postscript
graphics to the output stream cout. The graphics are drawn by invoking member func-
tions.
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 119

9.4 The functions in libplot: A detailed listing

In the current release of GNU libplot, any Plotter supports 97 distinct operations.
A language binding for libplot necessarily includes 97 functions that correspond to
these operations. In the C binding, these 97 functions belong to the C API (application
programming interface). The name of each function begins with the prefix "pl " and
ends with the suffix " r". In the C++ binding, the 97 functions are implemented as public
members of the Plotter class. No prefix or suffix is used.
A language binding may also include functions for creating, selecting, and deleting Plot-
ters. For example, the C binding includes the additional functions pl_newpl_r and pl_
deletepl_r. See Section 9.2.1 [The C API], page 94.
The 97 functions that operate on a specified Plotter are divided into the four sets tabu-
lated below.
1. Control functions: functions that open, initialize, or close the Plotter.
2. Functions that cause the Plotter to draw objects.
3. Functions that set or affect the Plotter’s drawing attributes.
4. Functions that alter the affine map used by the Plotter to transform user coordinates
to device coordinates.
Many functions come in two versions: integer and double precision floating point. Inter-
nally, libplot uses double precision floating point. The integer versions are provided for
backward compatibility. If there are two versions of a function, the name of the floating
point version begins with the letter ‘f’.
Many functions come in both absolute and relative versions, also. The latter use relative
coordinates (i.e., coordinates relative to the current position of the graphics cursor), and
their names end in ‘rel’.
Currently, only a few of the 97 functions have meaningful return values.

9.4.1 Control functions

The following are the “control functions” in libplot. They are the basic functions that
open, initialize, or close an already-created Plotter. They are listed in the approximate
order in which they would be called.
In the current C binding, each of these functions takes a pointer to a plPlotter as
its first argument. Also in the current C binding, the name of each function begins with
"pl " and ends with " r". (" r" stands for ‘revised’ or ‘reentrant’.) For information on
older C bindings, see Section 9.2.2 [Older C APIs], page 95. In the C++ binding, these are
member functions of the Plotter class and its subclasses, and the prefix and suffix are not
used.
int openpl ();
openpl opens a Plotter, i.e., begins a page of graphics. This resets the Plotter’s
drawing attributes to their default values. A negative return value indicates
the Plotter could not be opened.
Currently, an X Plotter pops up a new window on an X Window System display
for each page of graphics, i.e., with each invocation of openpl. Future releases
may support window re-use.
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 120

int bgcolor (int red, int green, int blue);

bgcolor sets the background color for the Plotter’s graphics display, using a
48-bit RGB color model. The arguments red, green and blue specify the red,
green and blue intensities of the background color. Each is an integer in the
range 0x0000. . . 0xffff, i.e., 0. . . 65535. The choice (0, 0, 0) signifies black,
and the choice (65535, 65535, 65535) signifies white.
bgcolor affects only Plotters that have a notion of background color, i.e.,
X Plotters, X Drawable Plotters, PNG Plotters, PNM Plotters, and GIF Plot-
ters (all of which produce bitmaps), CGM Plotters, ReGIS Plotters and Metafile
Plotters. Its effect is simple: the next time the erase operation is invoked on
such a Plotter, its display will be filled with the specified color.

int bgcolorname (const char *name);

bgcolorname sets the background color for the the graphics display to be name.
Unrecognized colors are interpreted as "white". For information on what color
names are recognized, see Appendix B [Color Names], page 166. A 24-bit RGB
color may also be specified as a six-digit hexadecimal string, e.g., "#c0c0c0".
bgcolorname affects only Plotters that have a notion of background color,
i.e., X Plotters, X Drawable Plotters, PNG Plotters, PNM Plotters, and GIF
Plotters (all of which produce bitmaps), CGM Plotters, ReGIS Plotters, and
Metafile Plotters. Its effect is simple: the next time the erase operation is
invoked on such a Plotter, its display will be filled with the specified color.
SVG Plotters and CGM Plotters support "none" as a value for the background
color. It will turn off the background: the drawn objects will not be backed
by anything. This is useful when the generated SVG or WebCGM file is to be
placed on a Web page.

int erase ();

erase begins the next frame of a multiframe page, by clearing all previously
plotted objects from the graphics display, and filling it with the background
color (if any).
It is frequently useful to invoke erase at the beginning of each page, i.e., im-
mediately after invoking openpl. That is because some Plotters are persistent,
in the sense that objects drawn within an openpl. . . closepl pair remain on
the graphics display even after a new page is begun by a subsequent invoca-
tion of openpl. Currently, only X Drawable Plotters and Tektronix Plotters
are persistent. Future releases may support optional persistence for X Plotters
also.
On X Plotters and X Drawable Plotters the effects of invoking erase will be
altogether different if the Plotter parameter USE_DOUBLE_BUFFERING is set to
"yes". In this case, objects will be written to an off-screen buffer rather than to
the graphics display, and invoking erase will (1) copy the contents of this buffer
to the display, and (2) erase the buffer by filling it with the background color.
This ‘double buffering’ feature facilitates smooth animation. See Section 9.5
[Plotter Parameters], page 136.
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 121

int space (int x0, int y0, int x1, int y1);
int fspace (double x0, double y0, double x1, double y1);
space and fspace take two pairs of arguments, specifying the positions of the
lower left and upper right corners of a rectangular window in the user coordinate
system that will be mapped to the ‘viewport’: the rectangular portion of the
output device that graphics will be drawn in. The default window is a square,
with opposite corners (0,0) and (1,1).
In mathematical terms, calling space or fspace sets the affine transformation
from user coordinates to device coordinates. That is, it sets the transformation
matrix attribute for each object subsequently drawn on the display. Either
space or fspace would usually be invoked at the beginning of each page of
graphics, i.e., immediately after the call to openpl. Additional calls to space or
fspace are allowed, and there are several “mapping functions” that also affect
the transformation matrix attribute. See Section 9.4.4 [Mapping Functions],
page 135.
Note that the size and location of the viewport depend on the type of Plotter,
and on the Plotter parameters that are specified at Plotter creation time. For
example, the default viewport used by any Illustrator, Postscript, Fig, PCL,
and HP-GL Plotter is a square whose size depends on the Plotter’s page type.
See Appendix C [Page and Viewport Sizes], page 167.

int space2 (int x0, int y0, int x1, int y1, int x2, int y2);
int fspace2 (double x0, double y0, double x1, double y1, double x2, double y2);
space2 and fspace2 are extended versions of space and fspace. Their argu-
ments are the three defining vertices of an parallelogram-shaped window in the
user coordinate system. The specified vertices are the lower left, the lower right,
and the upper left. This window will be mapped affinely onto the viewport:
the rectangular portion of the output device that graphics will be drawn in.

int havecap (const char *s);

havecap is not really a control function: it is a query function. It tests whether
or not a Plotter, which need not be open, has a specified capability. The
return value is 0, 1, or 2, signifying no/yes/maybe. For unrecognized capabili-
ties the return value is zero. Recognized capabilities include "WIDE LINES"
(i.e., the ability to draw lines with a non-default thickness), "DASH ARRAY"
(the ability to draw in arbitrary dashing styles, as requested by the linedash
function), "SETTABLE BACKGROUND" (the ability to set the color of the
background), and "SOLID FILL". The "HERSHEY FONTS", "PS FONTS",
"PCL FONTS", and "STICK FONTS" capabilities indicate whether or not
fonts of a particular class are supported. See Section A.1 [Text Fonts], page 144.
All Plotters except Tektronix Plotters have the "SOLID FILL" capability,
meaning they can fill paths with solid color. Each such Plotter has at least one
of the "EVEN ODD FILL" and "NONZERO WINDING NUMBER FILL"
capabilities. These indicate the supported rules for determining the ‘inside’ of
a path.
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 122

The ‘maybe’ value is returned for most capabilities by Metafile Plotters, which
do no drawing themselves. The output of a Metafile Plotter must be translated
to another format, or displayed, by invoking plot.
int flushpl ();
flushpl flushes (i.e., pushes onward) all previously plotted objects to the graph-
ics display. This is useful only if the affected Plotter is one that does real-time
plotting (X Plotters, X Drawable Plotters, ReGIS Plotters, Tektronix Plotters,
and Metafile Plotters). It ensures that all previously plotted objects are visible
to the user. On Plotters that do not do real-time plotting, this operation has
no effect.
int closepl ();
closepl closes a Plotter, i.e., ends a page of graphics. If a path is in progress,
it is first ended and plotted, as if endpath had been called. A negative return
value indicates the Plotter could not be closed.
In the present release of libplot, some Plotters output each page of graphics
immediately after it is plotted, i.e., when closepl is invoked to end the page.
That is the case with PCL and HP-GL Plotters, in particular. Plotters that
can output only a single page of graphics (PNG, PNM, GIF, SVG, Illustrator,
and Fig Plotters) do so immediately after the first page is plotted, i.e., when
closepl is invoked for the first time. Postscript and CGM Plotters store all
pages of graphics internally, and do not produce output until they are deleted.

9.4.2 Object-drawing functions

The following are the “drawing functions” in libplot. When invoked on a Plotter, these
functions cause it to draw objects (paths, text strings, marker symbols, and points [i.e.,
pixels]) on the associated graphics display.
Paths may be simple or compound. A simple path is a sequence of contiguous line
segments, arc segments (either circular or elliptic), and/or Bezier curve segments (either
quadratic or cubic). Such simple paths are drawn incrementally, one segment at a time.
A simple path may also be a circle, rectangle, or ellipse. A compound path consists of
multiple simple paths, which must be nested.
You do not need to begin a path by calling any special function. You should, at least in
theory, end a path under construction, and request that it be drawn on the graphics display,
by calling endpath. But the endpath function is automatically called when any other object
is drawn, and at the end of each page of graphics. It is also called automatically when any
path-related attribute is changed: for example, when move is called to change the graphics
cursor position. So endpath seldom needs to be invoked explicitly.
When drawing a compound path, you would end each of its constituent simple paths
by calling endsubpath, and the compound path as a whole by calling endpath. After each
call to endsubpath, you are allowed to call move to reposition the graphics cursor, prior to
beginning the next simple path. Such a call to move will not automatically invoke endpath.
This is an exception to the above rule.
In the current C binding, each of these functions takes a pointer to a plPlotter as
its first argument. Also in the current C binding, the name of each function begins with
"pl " and ends with " r". (" r" stands for ‘revised’ or ‘reentrant’.) For information on
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 123

older C bindings, see Section 9.2.2 [Older C APIs], page 95. In the C++ binding, these are
member functions of the Plotter class and its subclasses, and the prefix and suffix are not
used.
int alabel (int horiz justify, int vert justify, const char *s);
alabel takes three arguments horiz justify, vert justify, and s, which specify
an ‘adjusted label,’ i.e., a justified text string. The path under construction
(if any) is ended and drawn, as if endpath had been called, and the string s is
drawn according to the specified justifications. If horiz justify is equal to ‘l’,
‘c’, or ‘r’, then the string will be drawn with left, center or right justification,
relative to the current graphics cursor position. If vert justify is equal to ‘b’, ‘x’,
‘c’, ‘C’, or ‘t’, then the bottom, baseline, center, cap line, or top of the string
will be placed even with the current graphics cursor position. The graphics
cursor is moved to the right end of the string if left justification is specified,
and to the left end if right justification is specified.
The string may contain escape sequences of various sorts (see Section A.4 [Text
String Format], page 151), though it should not contain line feeds or carriage
returns. In fact it should include only printable characters, from the byte ranges
0x20. . . 0x7e and 0xa0. . . 0xff. The string may be plotted at a nonzero angle,
if textangle has been called.
int arc (int xc, int yc, int x0, int y0, int x1, int y1);
int farc (double xc, double yc, double x0, double y0, double x1, double y1);
int arcrel (int xc, int yc, int x0, int y0, int x1, int y1);
int farcrel (double xc, double yc, double x0, double y0, double x1, double y1);
arc and farc take six arguments specifying the beginning (x0, y0), end (x1,
y1), and center (xc, yc) of a circular arc. If the graphics cursor is at (x0, y0)
and a path is under construction, then the arc is added to the path. Otherwise
the current path (if any) is ended and drawn, as if endpath had been called,
and the arc begins a new path. In all cases the graphics cursor is moved to (x1,
y1).
The direction of the arc (clockwise or counterclockwise) is determined by the
convention that the arc, centered at (xc, yc), sweep through an angle of at most
180 degrees. If the three points appear to be collinear, the direction is taken
to be counterclockwise. If (xc, yc) is not equidistant from (x0, y0) and (x1,
y1) as it should be, it is corrected by being moved to the closest point on the
perpendicular bisector of the line segment joining (x0, y0) and (x1, y1). arcrel
and farcrel are similar to arc and farc, but use cursor-relative coordinates.
int bezier2 (int x0, int y0, int x1, int y1, int x2, int y2);
int fbezier2 (double x0, double y0, double x1, double y1, double x2, double y2);
int bezier2rel (int x0, int y0, int x1, int y1, int x2, int y2);
int fbezier2rel (double x0, double y0, double x1, double y1, double x2, double y2);
bezier2 and fbezier2 take six arguments specifying the beginning p0=(x0,
y0) and end p2=(x2, y2) of a quadratic Bezier curve, and its intermediate
control point p1=(x1, y1). If the graphics cursor is at p0 and a path is under
construction, then the curve is added to the path. Otherwise the current path
(if any) is ended and drawn, as if endpath had been called, and the curve begins
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 124

a new path. In all cases the graphics cursor is moved to p2. bezier2rel and
fbezier2rel are similar to bezier2 and fbezier2, but use cursor-relative
coordinates.
The quadratic Bezier curve is tangent at p0 to the line segment joining p0 to p1,
and is tangent at p2 to the line segment joining p1 to p2. So it fits snugly into
a triangle with vertices p0, p1, and p2.
When using a PCL Plotter to draw Bezier curves on a LaserJet III, you should
set the parameter PCL_BEZIERS to "no". That is because the LaserJet III,
which was Hewlett–Packard’s first PCL 5 printer, does not recognize the Bezier
instructions supported by later PCL 5 printers. See Section 9.5 [Plotter Pa-
rameters], page 136.

int bezier3 (int x0, int y0, int x1, int y1, int x2, int y2, int x3, int y3);
int fbezier3 (double x0, double y0, double x1, double y1, double x2, double y2, double
x3, double y3);
int bezier3rel (int x0, int y0, int x1, int y1, int x2, int y2, int x3, int y3);
int fbezier3rel (double x0, double y0, double x1, double y1, double x2, double y2,
double x3, double y3);
bezier3 and fbezier3 take eight arguments specifying the beginning p0=(x0,
y0) and end p3=(x3, y3) of a cubic Bezier curve, and its intermediate control
points p1=(x1, y1) and p2=(x2, y2). If the graphics cursor is at p0 and a
path is under construction, then the curve is added to the path. Otherwise the
current path (if any) is ended and drawn, as if endpath had been called, and
the curve begins a new path. In all cases the graphics cursor is moved to p3.
bezier3rel and fbezier3rel are similar to bezier3 and fbezier3, but use
cursor-relative coordinates.
The cubic Bezier curve is tangent at p0 to the line segment joining p0 to p1,
and is tangent at p3 to the line segment joining p2 to p3. So it fits snugly into
a quadrangle with vertices p0, p1, p2, and p3.
When using a PCL Plotter to draw Bezier curves on a LaserJet III, you should
set the parameter PCL_BEZIERS to "no". That is because the LaserJet III,
which was Hewlett–Packard’s first PCL 5 printer, does not recognize the Bezier
instructions supported by later PCL 5 printers. See Section 9.5 [Plotter Pa-
rameters], page 136.

int box (int x1, int y1, int x2, int y2);
int fbox (double x1, double y1, double x2, double y2);
int boxrel (int x1, int y1, int x2, int y2);
int fboxrel (double x1, double y1, double x2, double y2);
box and fbox take four arguments specifying the starting corner (x1, y1) and
opposite corner (x2, y2) of a ‘box’, or rectangle. The path under construction
(if any) is ended, and the box is drawn as a new path. This path is also ended,
and the graphics cursor is moved to the midpoint of the box. boxrel and
fboxrel are similar to box and fbox, but use cursor-relative coordinates.
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 125

int circle (int xc, int yc, int r);

int fcircle (double xc, double yc, double r);
int circlerel (int xc, int yc, int r);
int fcirclerel (double xc, double yc, double r);
circle and fcircle take three arguments specifying the center (xc, yc) and
radius (r) of a circle. The path under construction (if any) is ended, and the
circle is drawn as a new path. This path is also ended, and the graphics cursor
is moved to (xc, yc). circlerel and fcirclerel are similar to circle and
fcircle, but use cursor-relative coordinates for xc and yc.
int cont (int x, int y);
int fcont (double x, double y);
int contrel (int x, int y);
int fcontrel (double x, double y);
cont and fcont take two arguments specifying the coordinates (x, y) of a point.
If a path is under construction, the line segment from the current graphics cursor
position to the point (x, y) is added to it. Otherwise the line segment begins
a new path. In all cases the graphics cursor is moved to (x, y). contrel and
fcontrel are similar to cont and fcont, but use cursor-relative coordinates.
int ellarc (int xc, int yc, int x0, int y0, int x1, int y1);
int fellarc (double xc, double yc, double x0, double y0, double x1, double y1);
int ellarcrel (int xc, int yc, int x0, int y0, int x1, int y1);
int fellarcrel (double xc, double yc, double x0, double y0, double x1, double y1);
ellarc and fellarc take six arguments specifying the three points pc=(xc,yc),
p0=(x0,y0), and p1=(x1,y1) that define a so-called quarter ellipse. This is an
elliptic arc from p0 to p1 with center pc. If the graphics cursor is at point p0
and a path is under construction, the quarter-ellipse is added to it. Otherwise
the path under construction (if any) is ended and drawn, as if endpath had
been called, and the quarter-ellipse begins a new path. In all cases the graphics
cursor is moved to p1.
The quarter-ellipse is an affinely transformed version of a quarter circle. It is
drawn so as to have control points p0, p1, and p0+p1−pc. This means that it is
tangent at p0 to the line segment joining p0 to p0+p1−pc, and is tangent at p1
to the line segment joining p1 to p0+p1−pc. So it fits snugly into a triangle with
these three control points as vertices. Notice that the third control point is the
reflection of pc through the line joining p0 and p1. ellarcrel and fellarcrel
are similar to ellarc and fellarc, but use cursor-relative coordinates.
int ellipse (int xc, int yc, int rx, int ry, int angle);
int fellipse (double xc, double yc, double rx, double ry, double angle);
int ellipserel (int xc, int yc, int rx, int ry, int angle);
int fellipserel (double xc, double yc, double rx, double ry, double angle);
ellipse and fellipse take five arguments specifying the center (xc, yc) of an
ellipse, the lengths of its semiaxes (rx and ry), and the inclination of the first
semiaxis in the counterclockwise direction from the x axis in the user coordinate
system. The path under construction (if any) is ended, and the ellipse is drawn
as a new path. This path is also ended, and the graphics cursor is moved to
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 126

(xc, yc). ellipserel and fellipserel are similar to ellipse and fellipse,
but use cursor-relative coordinates.
int endpath ();
endpath terminates the path under construction, if any, and draws it. It also
removes the path from the current graphics context, so that a new path may
be constructed.
The path under construction may be a simple path, or a compound path con-
structed with the aid of endsubpath (see below). A simple path is constructed
by one or more successive calls to cont, line, arc, ellarc, bezier2, bezier3,
and/or their floating point counterparts. A simple path may also be constructed
by a single call to circle, ellipse, or box.
It is often not necessary to call endpath explicitly, since it is frequently called
automatically. It will be called if any non-path object is drawn, if any path-
related drawing attribute is set, or if move or fmove is invoked to set the cursor
position. It will also be called if restorestate is called to pop a graphics
context off the stack, and if closepl is called to end a page of graphics. So it is
seldom necessary to call endpath explicitly. However, if a Plotter plots objects
in real time, calling endpath will ensure that a completed path is drawn on the
graphics display without delay.
int endsubpath ();
endsubpath terminates the simple path under construction, if any, and signals
that the construction of the next simple path in a compound path is to begin.
Immediately after endsubpath is called, it is permissible to call move or fmove
to reposition the graphics cursor. (At other times in the drawing of a com-
pound path, calling move or fmove would force a premature end to the path,
by automatically invoking endpath.)
int label (const char *s);
label takes a single string argument s and draws the text contained in s at
the current graphics cursor position. The text is left justified, and the graphics
cursor is moved to the right end of the string. This function is provided for back-
ward compatibility; the function call label(s) is equivalent to alabel(‘l’,‘x’,s).
int labelwidth (const char *s);
double flabelwidth (const char *s);
labelwidth and flabelwidth are not really object-drawing functions: they are
query functions. They compute and return the width of a string in the current
font, in the user coordinate system. The string is not drawn.
int line (int x1, int y1, int x2, int y2);
int fline (double x1, double y1, double x2, double y2);
int linerel (int x1, int y1, int x2, int y2);
int flinerel (double x1, double y1, double x2, double y2);
line and fline take four arguments specifying the start point (x1, y1) and
end point (x2, y2) of a line segment. If the graphics cursor is at (x1, y1) and
a path is under construction, the line segment is added to it. Otherwise the
path under construction (if any) is ended and drawn, as if endpath had been
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 127

called, and the line segment begins a new path. In all cases the graphics cursor
is moved to (x2, y2). linerel and flinerel are similar to line and fline,
but use cursor-relative coordinates.
int marker (int x, int y, int type, int size);
int fmarker (double x, double y, int type, double size);
int markerrel (int x, int y, int type, int size);
int fmarkerrel (double x, double y, int type, double size);
marker and fmarker take four arguments specifying the position (x,y) of a
marker symbol, its type, and its font size in user coordinates. The path under
construction (if any) is ended and drawn, as if endpath had been called, and the
marker symbol is plotted. The graphics cursor is moved to (x,y). markerrel
and fmarkerrel are similar to marker and fmarker, but use cursor-relative
coordinates for the position (x,y).
A marker symbol is a visual representation of a point, which is visible on all
types of Plotter. In this it differs from the points produced by the point func-
tion (see below). Marker symbol types 0. . . 31 are taken from a standard set,
and marker symbol types 32 and above are interpreted as the index of a char-
acter in the current text font. See Section A.5 [Marker Symbols], page 163.
int point (int x, int y);
int fpoint (double x, double y);
int pointrel (int x, int y);
int fpointrel (double x, double y);
point and fpoint take two arguments specifying the coordinates (x, y) of a
point. The path under construction (if any) is ended and drawn, as if endpath
had been called, and the point is plotted. The graphics cursor is moved to
(x, y). pointrel and fpointrel are similar to point and fpoint, but use
cursor-relative coordinates.
‘Point’ is a misnomer. Any Plotter that produces a bitmap, i.e., an X Plotter,
an X Drawable Plotter, a PNG Plotter, a PNM Plotter, or a GIF Plotter, draws
a point as a single pixel. Most other Plotters draw a point as a small solid circle,
usually so small as to be invisible. So point should really be called pixel.

9.4.3 Attribute-setting functions

The following are the “attribute functions” in libplot. When invoked on a Plotter, these
functions set its drawing attributes, or save them or restore them. Path-related attributes
include graphics cursor position, pen color, fill color, fill rule, line thickness, line style, cap
style, join style, miter limit, and transformation matrix. Text-related attributes include
pen color, font name, font size, text angle, and transformation matrix.
Setting any path-related drawing attribute automatically terminates and draws the path
under construction (if any), as if the endpath operation had been invoked. The ‘orienta-
tion’ attribute (clockwise/counterclockwise), which affects circles, ellipses, and boxes, is an
exception to this. The exception allows a compound path to include circles, ellipses, and
boxes with different orientations.
In the current C binding, each of these functions takes a pointer to a plPlotter as
its first argument. Also in the current C binding, the name of each function begins with
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 128

"pl " and ends with " r". (" r" stands for ‘revised’ or ‘reentrant’.) For information on
older C bindings, see Section 9.2.2 [Older C APIs], page 95. In the C++ binding, these are
member functions of the Plotter class and its subclasses, and the prefix and suffix are not
used.
int capmod (const char *s);
capmod terminates and draws the path under construction (if any), as if
endpath had been called, and sets the cap mode (i.e., cap style) for all paths
subsequently drawn on the graphics display. Recognized styles are "butt" (the
default), "round", and "projecting". The three styles are visibly distinct only
if the line thickness is fairly large. Butt caps do not extend beyond the end of
the path. The other two kinds do, however. Round caps are filled semicircles,
and projecting caps are filled rectangular regions that extend a distance equal
to half the line width beyond the end of the path.
PNG, PNM, GIF, PCL, and HP-GL Plotters support a fourth cap mode, "tri-
angular". (For all but PCL and HP-GL Plotters, the support is currently only
partial.) Plotters other than these treat "triangular" as equivalent to "round".
This function has no effect on ReGIS or Tektronix Plotters. Also, it has no
effect on HP-GL Plotters if the parameter HPGL_VERSION is set to a value less
than "2" (the default), or on CGM Plotters if the parameter CGM_MAX_VERSION
is set to a value less than "3". See Section 9.5 [Plotter Parameters], page 136.
int color (int red, int green, int blue);
color is a convenience function. Calling color is equivalent to calling both
pencolor and fillcolor, to set both the the pen color and fill color of all
objects subsequently drawn on the graphics display. Note that the physical fill
color depends also on the fill level, which is specified by calling filltype.
int colorname (const char *name);
colorname is a convenience function. Calling colorname is equivalent to calling
both pencolorname and fillcolorname, to set both the the pen color and fill
color of all objects subsequently drawn on the graphics display. Note that the
physical fill color depends also on the fill level, which is specified by calling
filltype.
int fillcolor (int red, int green, int blue);
fillcolor terminates and draws the path under construction (if any), as if
endpath had been called, and sets the fill color for all paths subsequently drawn
on the graphics display, using a 48-bit RGB color model. The arguments red,
green and blue specify the red, green and blue intensities of the fill color. Each is
an integer in the range 0x0000. . . 0xffff, i.e., 0. . . 65535. The choice (0, 0, 0)
signifies black, and the choice (65535, 65535, 65535) signifies white. Note that
the physical fill color depends also on the fill level, which is specified by calling
filltype.
int fillcolorname (const char *name);
fillcolorname sets the fill color of all paths subsequently drawn on the graph-
ics display to be name. Unrecognized colors are interpreted as "black". For
information on what color names are recognized, see Appendix B [Color Names],
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 129

page 166. A 24-bit RGB color may also be specified as a six-digit hexadecimal
string, e.g., "#c0c0c0".
Note that the physical fill color depends also on the fill level, which is specified
by calling filltype.

int fillmod (const char *s);

fillmod terminates and draws the path under construction (if any), as
if endpath had been called, and sets the fill mode, i.e., fill rule, for all
paths subsequently drawn on the graphics display. The fill rule affects only
compound paths and self-intersecting simple paths: it determines which points
are ‘inside’. Two rules are supported: "even-odd" (the default for all Plotters),
and "nonzero-winding". For the distinction, see the Postscript Language
Reference Manual. "alternate" is an alias for "even-odd" and "winding" is an
alias for "nonzero-winding".
CGM, Fig, and ReGIS Plotters do not support the "nonzero-winding" rule,
because the CGM, Fig, and ReGIS vector graphics formats do not support it.
Also, HP-GL Plotters do not support "nonzero-winding" if HPGL_VERSION is
set to a value less than "2" (the default). See Section 9.5 [Plotter Parameters],
page 136.
The LaserJet III, which was Hewlett–Packard’s first PCL 5 printer, did not
support the nonzero-winding fill rule. However, all later PCL 5 printers from
Hewlett–Packard support it.

int filltype (int level);

filltype terminates and draws the path under construction (if any), as if
endpath had been called, and sets the fill level for all subsequently drawn
paths. A value of 0 for level specifies no filling. This is the default. A value
of 1 specifies 100% filling: the fill color will be the color previously specified by
calling fillcolor or fillcolorname.
As a convenience to the user, level may be set to any value in the range
0x0000. . . 0xffff, i.e., 0. . . 65535. Any nonzero value will produce filling. If
level=0xffff, the fill color will be white. Values in the range 0x0001. . . 0xffff
are interpreted as specifying a desaturation, or gray level. For example, 0x8000
specifies 50% filling (the fill color will be half-way between the color specified
by calling fillcolor or fillcolorname, and white).
To draw the region bounded by a path in an edgeless way, you would call
filltype to turn on the filling of the interior, and pentype to turn off the
drawing of the boundary.
Tektronix Plotters do not support filling, and HP-GL Plotters support filling
of arbitrary paths only if the parameter HPGL_VERSION is equal to "1.5" or "2"
(the default). (If the version is "1" then only circles and rectangles aligned
with the coordinate axes may be filled.) Opaque filling, including white filling,
is supported only if the parameter HPGL_VERSION is "2" and the parameter
HPGL_OPAQUE_MODE is "yes" (the default). See Section 9.5 [Plotter Parameters],
page 136.
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 130

int fmiterlimit (double limit);

fmiterlimit terminates and draws the path under construction (if any), as if
endpath had been called, and sets the miter limit for all paths subsequently
drawn on the graphics display. The miter limit controls the treatment of corners,
if the join mode is set to "miter" (the default). At a join point of a path, the
‘miter length’ is defined to be the distance between the inner corner and the
outer corner. The miter limit is the maximum value that will be tolerated for
the miter length divided by the line thickness. If this value is exceeded, the
miter will be cut off: the "bevel" join mode will be used instead.
Examples of typical values for limit are 10.43 (the default, which cuts off miters
if the join angle is less than 11 degrees), 2.0 (the same, for 60 degrees), and
1.414 (the same, for 90 degrees). In general, the miter limit is the cosecant of
one-half the minimum angle for mitered joins. The minimum meaningful value
for limit is 1.0, which converts all mitered joins to beveled joins, irrespective of
join angle. Specifying a value less than 1.0 resets the limit to the default.
This function has no effect on X Drawable Plotters or X Plotters, since the
X Window System miter limit, which is also 10.43, cannot be altered. It also
has no effect on Tektronix, ReGIS, or Fig Plotters, or on HP-GL Plotters if
the parameter HPGL_VERSION is set to a value less than "2" (the default). See
Section 9.5 [Plotter Parameters], page 136. The miter limit used by HP-GL or
PCL Plotters is always rounded to the closest integer, downward.
int fontname (const char *font name);
double ffontname (const char *font name);
fontname and ffontname take a single case-insensitive string argument,
font name, specifying the name of the font to be used for all text strings
subsequently drawn on the graphics display. (The font for plotting strings is
fully specified by calling fontname, fontsize, and textangle.) The size of
the font in user coordinates is returned.
The default font name depends on the type of Plotter. It is "Helvetica" for all
Plotters except for PCL Plotters, for which it is "Univers", and PNG, PNM,
GIF, HP-GL, ReGIS, Tektronix and Metafile Plotters, for which it is "Hershey-
Serif". If the argument font name is NULL or the empty string, or the font is
not available, the default font name will be used. Which fonts are available also
depends on the type of Plotter; for a list of all available fonts, see Section A.1
[Text Fonts], page 144.
int fontsize (int size);
double ffontsize (double size);
fontsize and ffontsize take a single argument, interpreted as the size, in the
user coordinate system, of the font to be used for all text strings subsequently
drawn on the graphics display. (The font for plotting strings is fully specified
by calling fontname, fontsize, and textangle.) The size of the font in user
coordinates is returned.
A negative value for size sets the size to the default, which depends on the
type of Plotter. Typically, the default font size is 1/50 times the size (i.e.,
minimum dimension) of the display. The interpretation of zero font size is also
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 131

Plotter-dependent (most Plotters do not draw text strings if the font size is
zero).
int joinmod (const char *s);
joinmod terminates and draws the path under construction (if any), as if
endpath had been called, and sets the join mode (i.e., join style) for all paths
subsequently drawn on the graphics display. Recognized styles are "miter"
(the default), "round", and "bevel". The three styles are visibly distinct only
if the line thickness is fairly large. Mitered joins are sharp, rounded joins are
round, and beveled joins are squared off. However, unusually sharp joins are
never mitered: instead, they are beveled. The angle at which beveling replaces
mitering may be specified by calling fmiterlimit.
PNG, PNM, GIF, PCL, and HP-GL Plotters support a fourth join mode, "tri-
angular". Other Plotters treat "triangular" as equivalent to "round".
This function has no effect on ReGIS or Tektronix Plotters. Also, it has no
effect on HP-GL Plotters if the parameter HPGL_VERSION is set to a value less
than "2" (the default), or on CGM Plotters if the parameter CGM_MAX_VERSION
is set to a value less than "3". See Section 9.5 [Plotter Parameters], page 136.
int linedash (int n, const int *dashes, int offset);
int flinedash (int n, const double *dashes, double offset);
linedash and flinedash terminate and draw the path under construction
(if any), as if endpath had been called, and set the line style for all paths
subsequently drawn on the graphics display. They provide much finer control
of dash patterns than the linemod function (see below) provides. dashes should
be an array of length n. Its elements, which should be positive, are interpreted
as distances in the user coordinate system. Along any path, circle, or ellipse,
the elements dashes[0]. . . dashes[n-1] alternately specify the length of a dash
and the length of a gap between dashes. When the end of the array is reached,
the reading of the array wraps around to the beginning. If the array is empty,
i.e., n equals zero, there is no dashing: the drawn line is solid.
The offset argument specifies the ‘phase’ of the dash pattern relative to the
start of the path. It is interpreted as the distance into the dash pattern at
which the dashing should begin. For example, if offset equals zero then the
path will begin with a dash, of length dashes[0] in user space. If offset equals
dashes[0] then the path will begin with a gap of length dashes[1], and so forth.
offset is allowed to be negative.
Not all Plotters fully support linedash and flinedash. PCL and HP-GL
Plotters cannot dash with a nonzero offset, and in the dash patterns used by
X and X Drawable Plotters, each dash or gap has a maximum length of 255
pixels. linedash and flinedash have no effect at all on Tektronix, ReGIS,
and Fig Plotters. Also, they have no effect on HP-GL Plotters for which the
parameter HPGL_VERSION is less than "2" (the default), or on CGM Plotters
for which the parameter CGM_MAX_VERSION is less than "3". For information
on Plotter parameters, see Section 9.5 [Plotter Parameters], page 136.
Warning: If the transformation from the user coordinate system to the device
coordinate system is anisotropic, each dash pattern should ideally be drawn on
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 132

the graphics display with a length that depends on its direction. But currently,
only SVG and Postscript Plotters do this. Other Plotters always draw any
specified dash pattern with the same length, irrespective of its direction. The
length that is used is the minimum length, in the device coordinate system,
that can correspond to the specified dash pattern length in the user coordinate
system.

int linemod (const char *s);

linemod terminates and draws the path under construction (if any), as if
endpath had been called, and sets the line style for all paths subsequently
drawn on the graphics display. The supported line styles are "solid",
"dotted", "dotdashed", "shortdashed", "longdashed", "dotdotdashed",
"dotdotdotdashed", and "disconnected". The first seven correspond to the
following dash patterns:
"solid" --------------------------------
"dotted" - - - - - - - -
"dotdashed" ---- - ---- - ---- -
"shortdashed" ---- ---- ---- ----
"longdashed" ------- ------- -------
"dotdotdashed" ---- - - ---- - -
"dotdotdotdashed" ---- - - - ---- - - -
In the preceding patterns, each hyphen stands for one line thickness. This is
the case for sufficiently thick lines, at least. So for sufficiently thick lines, the
distance over which a dash pattern repeats is scaled proportionately to the line
thickness.
The "disconnected" line style is special. A "disconnected" path is rendered as
a set of filled circles, each of which has diameter equal to the nominal line thick-
ness. One of these circles is centered on each of the juncture points of the path
(i.e., the endpoints of the line segments or arcs from which it is constructed).
Circles and ellipses with "disconnected" line style are invisible. Disconnected
paths are not filled; this includes circles and ellipses.
All line styles are supported by all Plotters, with the following exceptions. HP-
GL Plotters do not support the "dotdotdotdashed" style unless the parameter
HPGL_VERSION is set to "2" (the default). Tektronix Plotters do not support the
"dotdotdotdashed" style, and do not support the "dotdotdashed" style unless
the parameter TERM is set to "kermit". See Section 9.5 [Plotter Parameters],
page 136.

int linewidth (int size);

int flinewidth (double size);
linewidth and flinewidth terminate and draws the path under construc-
tion (if any), as if endpath had been called, and set the thickness, in the user
coordinate system, of all paths subsequently drawn on the graphics display.
A negative value resets the thickness to the default. The default thickness de-
pends on the type of Plotter. For most Plotters, it is 1/850 times the size
of the viewport, i.e., the drawn-on portion of the display. (Here ‘size’ means
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 133

minimum dimension.) But for Plotters that produce bitmaps, i.e., X Plotters,
X Drawable Plotters, PNG Plotters, PNM Plotters, and GIF Plotters, it is zero.
By convention, a zero-thickness line is the thinnest line that can be drawn.
However, the drawing editors idraw and xfig treat zero-thickness lines as in-
visible. So when producing editable graphics with a Postscript or Fig Plotter,
using a zero line thickness may not be desirable.
Tektronix and ReGIS Plotters do not support drawing with other than a default
thickness, and HP-GL Plotters do not support doing so if the parameter HPGL_
VERSION is set to a value less than "2" (the default; see Section 9.5 [Plotter
Parameters], page 136).
Warning: If the transformation from the user coordinate system to the device
coordinate system is anisotropic, each line segment in a polygonal path should
ideally be drawn on the graphics display with a thickness that depends on
its direction. But currently, only SVG and Postscript Plotters do this. Other
Plotters draw all line segments in a path with the same thickness. The thickness
that is used is the minimum thickness, in the device coordinate system, that
can correspond to the specified line thickness in the user coordinate system.
int move (int x, int y);
int fmove (double x, double y);
int moverel (int x, int y);
int fmoverel (double x, double y);
move and fmove take two arguments specifying the coordinates (x, y) of a point
to which the graphics cursor should be moved. The path under construction
(if any) is ended and drawn, as if endpath had been called, and the graphics
cursor is moved to (x, y). This is equivalent to lifting the pen on a plotter and
moving it to a new position, without drawing any line. moverel and fmoverel
are similar to move and fmove, but use cursor-relative coordinates.
When a new page of graphics is begun by invoking openpl, the cursor is initially
at the point (0,0) in user space. Most of the drawing functions reposition the
cursor. See Section 9.4.2 [Drawing Functions], page 122.
int orientation (int direction);
orientation sets the orientation for all circles, ellipses, and boxes subsequently
drawn on the graphics display. direction must be 1, meaning counterclockwise,
or −1, meaning clockwise. The default is 1.
orientation will have a visible effect on a circle, ellipse, or box only if it is
dashed, or if it is one of the simple paths in a filled compound path. Its effects
on filling, when the "nonzero-winding" fill rule is used, are dramatic, since it is
the orientation of each simple path in a compound path that determines which
points are ‘inside’ and which are ‘outside’.
int pencolor (int red, int green, int blue);
pencolor terminates and draws the path under construction (if any), as if
endpath had been called, and sets the pen color for all objects subsequently
drawn on the graphics display, using a 48-bit RGB color model. The arguments
red, green and blue specify the red, green and blue intensities of the pen color.
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 134

Each is an integer in the range 0x0000. . . 0xffff, i.e., 0. . . 65535. The choice
(0, 0, 0) signifies black, and the choice (65535, 65535, 65535) signifies white.
HP-GL Plotters support drawing with a white pen only if the value of the
parameter HPGL_VERSION is "2" (the default), and the value of the parameter
HPGL_OPAQUE_MODE is "yes" (the default). See Section 9.5 [Plotter Parameters],
page 136.
int pencolorname (const char *name);
pencolorname sets the pen color of all objects subsequently drawn on the graph-
ics display to be name. Unrecognized colors are interpreted as "black". For
information on what color names are recognized, see Appendix B [Color Names],
page 166. A 24-bit RGB color may also be specified as a six-digit hexadecimal
string, e.g., "#c0c0c0".
HP-GL Plotters support drawing with a white pen only if the value of the
parameter HPGL_VERSION is "2" (the default) and the value of the parameter
HPGL_OPAQUE_MODE is "yes" (the default). See Section 9.5 [Plotter Parameters],
page 136.
int pentype (int level);
pentype terminates and draws the path under construction (if any), as if
endpath had been called, and sets the pen level for all subsequently drawn
paths. A value of 1 for level specifies that an outline of each of these objects
should be drawn, in the color previously specified by calling pencolor or
pencolorname. This is the default. A value of 0 specifies that outlines should
not be drawn.
To draw the region bounded by a path in an edgeless way, you would call
pentype to turn off the drawing of the boundary, and filltype to turn on the
filling of the interior.
pentype also affects the drawing of marker symbols and points, i.e., pixels.
A value of 0 specifies that they should not be drawn.
Note: In future releases, pentype may also affect the drawing of text strings
(a value of 0 will specify that they should not be drawn). It already affects
text strings that are rendered using Hershey fonts, since they are drawn using
polygonal paths.
int restorestate ();
restorestate pops the current graphics context off the stack of drawing states.
The graphics context consists largely of libplot’s drawing attributes, which
are set by the attribute functions documented in this section. So popping off
the graphics context restores the drawing attributes to values they previously
had. A path under construction is regarded as part of the graphics context. For
this reason, calling restorestate automatically calls endpath to terminate and
draw the path under construction, if any. All graphics contexts on the stack
are popped off when closepl is called, as if restorestate had been called
repeatedly.
int savestate ();
savestate pushes the current graphics context onto the stack of drawing states.
The graphics context consists largely of libplot’s drawing attributes, which
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 135

are set by the attribute functions documented in this section. A path under
construction, if any, is regarded as part of the graphics context. That is because
paths may be drawn incrementally, one line segment or arc at a time. The new
graphics context created by savestate will contain no path. When the previous
graphics context is returned to by calling restorestate, the path previously
under construction may be continued.
int textangle (int angle);
double ftextangle (double angle);
textangle and ftextangle take one argument, which specifies the angle in
degrees counterclockwise from the x (horizontal) axis in the user coordinate
system, for text strings subsequently drawn on the graphics display. The default
angle is zero. (The font for plotting strings is fully specified by calling fontname,
fontsize, and textangle.) The size of the font for plotting strings, in user
coordinates, is returned.
Warning: Some X Window System displays do not generate or display rotated
fonts correctly. In effect, they only support a zero rotation angle.

9.4.4 Mapping functions

The following are the “mapping functions” in libplot. When invoked on a Plotter, they
affect the affine transformation it employs to map the user coordinate system to the device
coordinate system. That is, they affect the transformation matrix attribute of objects
subsequently drawn on the graphics display.
The names of these functions resemble those of the corresponding functions in the Post-
script language. For information on how to use them to draw graphics efficiently, consult
any good book on Postscript programming, or the Postscript Language Reference Manual.
Each of these functions, if called, terminates and draws the path under construction
(if any), as if endpath had been called.
In the current C binding, each of these functions takes a pointer to a plPlotter as
its first argument. Also in the current C binding, the name of each function begins with
"pl " and ends with " r". (" r" stands for ‘revised’ or ‘reentrant’.) For information on
older C bindings, see Section 9.2.2 [Older C APIs], page 95. In the C++ binding, these are
member functions of the Plotter class and its subclasses, and the prefix and suffix are not
used.
int fsetmatrix (double m0, double m1, double m2, double m3, double tx, double ty);
Use the Postscript-style transformation matrix [m0 m1 m2 m3 tx ty] as the
transformation matrix from user space to NDC (normalized device coordinate)
space. This matrix determines the transformation matrix from user space to
unnormalized device space, i.e., sets the transformation matrix attribute that
will be used when subsequently drawing objects on the graphics display.
In NDC space, the graphics display (i.e., viewport) has corners (0,0), (1,0),
(1,1), and (0,1). For information on the size of the graphics display in physical
units, see Appendix C [Page and Viewport Sizes], page 167.
The default transformation matrix from user space to NDC space is
[1 0 0 1 0 0], which means that by default, user coordinates are the same
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 136

as NDC coordinates. This transformation matrix is also altered by space,

fspace, space2, and fspace2, and by the following functions.
int fconcat (double m0, double m1, double m2, double m3, double tx, double ty);
Modify the transformation matrix from user space to NDC space by
pre-multiplying it by the matrix [m0 m1 m2 m3 tx ty]. Equivalently, apply
the linear transformation defined by the two-by-two matrix [m0 m1 m2 m3] to
the user coordinate system, and then translate by tx units in the x direction
and ty units in the y direction.
fconcat is a wrapper around the more fundamental fsetmatrix function. The
following three functions (frotate, fscale, ftranslate) are convenience func-
tions that are special cases of fconcat.
int frotate (double theta);
Modify the transformation matrix from user space to NDC space by
pre-multiplying it by the matrix [cos(theta) sin(theta) −sin(theta) cos(theta)
0 0]. Equivalently, rotate the user coordinate system axes about their origin
by theta degrees counterclockwise, with respect to their former orientation.
The position of the user coordinate origin and the size of the x and y units
remain unchanged.
int fscale (double sx, double sy);
Modify the transformation matrix from user space to NDC space by
pre-multiplying it by the matrix [sx 0 0 sy 0 0]. Equivalently, make the x and
y units in the user coordinate system be the size of sx and sy units in the
former user coordinate system. The position of the user coordinate origin and
the orientation of the coordinate axes are unchanged.
int ftranslate (double tx, double ty);
Modify the transformation matrix from user space to NDC space by
pre-multiplying it by the matrix [0 0 0 0 tx ty]. Equivalently, move the origin
of the user coordinate system by tx units in the x direction and ty units in
the y direction, relative to the former user coordinate system. The size of the
x and y units and the orientation of the coordinate axes are unchanged.

9.5 Plotter parameters

In designing the libplot library, every effort was made to make the Plotter interface inde-
pendent of the type of Plotter. To the extent that Plotters display individual (i.e., instance-
specific) behavior, that behavior is captured by a manageable number of Plotter parameters.
Each parameter has a value that is allowed to be a generic pointer (a void *). For most
parameters, the value is a string (a char *).
The parameter values of any Plotter are constant over the lifetime of the Plotter, and
are specified when the Plotter is created. In the C binding, a value for any parameter is
specified by calling the pl_setplparam function. The pl_setplparam function acts on
a plPlotterParams object, which encapsulates Plotter parameters. When a Plotter is
created by calling pl_newpl_r, a pointer to a plPlotterParams object is passed as the
final argument.
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 137

If at Plotter creation time a parameter is not specified, its default value will be used,
unless the parameter is string-valued and there is an environment variable of the same
name, in which case the value of that environment variable will be used. This rule increases
run-time flexibility: an application programmer may allow non-critical Plotter parameters
to be specified by the user via environment variables.
In the C++ binding, the PlotterParams class and PlotterParams::setplparam,
a member function, are the analogues of the plPlotterParams datatype and the function
pl_setplparam.
The following are the currently recognized parameters (unrecognized ones are ignored).
The most important ones are DISPLAY, which affects X Plotters, BITMAPSIZE, which af-
fects X Plotters, PNG Plotters, PNM Plotters, and GIF Plotters, PAGESIZE, which affects
Illustrator, Postscript, CGM, Fig, and HP-GL Plotters, and ROTATION, which affects all
Plotters except Metafile Plotters. These four parameters are listed first and the others
alphabetically. Most of the remaining parameters, such as the several whose names begin
with "HPGL", affect only a single type of Plotter.
DISPLAY (Default NULL.) The X Window System display on which the graphics display
will be popped up, as an X window. This is relevant only to X Plotters.
BITMAPSIZE
(Default "570x570".) The size of the graphics display (i.e., the viewport) in
terms of pixels. This is relevant only to X Plotters, PNG Plotters, PNM Plot-
ters, and GIF Plotters. For X Plotters, the value of this parameter will auto-
matically, if it is not set, be taken from the X resource Xplot.geometry. That
is for backward compatibility.
X Plotters support precise positioning of the graphics display. For example, if
BITMAPSIZE is "570x570+0+0" then it will be positioned in the upper left corner
of the X Window System display.
PAGESIZE (Default "letter".) The page type, which determines the size of the graphics
display (i.e., the viewport) used by the Plotter. This is relevant only to SVG,
Illustrator, Postscript, CGM, Fig, PCL, and HP-GL Plotters. "letter" means
an 8.5 in by 11 in page. Any ISO page size in the range "a0". . . "a4" or ANSI
page size in the range "a". . . "e" may be specified ("letter" is an alias for "a"
and "tabloid" is an alias for "b"). "legal", "ledger", and "b5" are recognized
page sizes also.
For Illustrator, Postscript, PCL and Fig Plotters, the graphics display will be,
by default, a square region centered on the specified page. (For example, it
will be a centered 8 in square if PAGESIZE is "letter".) For HP-GL Plotters, it
will be a square region of the same size, but will not by default be centered.
SVG format and WebCGM format have no notion of the Web page on which
the graphics display will ultimately be positioned. They do have a notion of
default display size, though this will normally be overridden when the SVG
or WebCGM file is placed on a Web page. For this default display size, SVG
and CGM Plotters will use the same graphics display size that is used by other
Plotters.
For the default size (and location) of the graphics display for each page type,
see Appendix C [Page and Viewport Sizes], page 167. You do not need to
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 138

use the default size, since either or both of its dimensions can be specified
explicitly. For example, PAGESIZE could be specified as "letter,xsize=4in",
or "a4,xsize=10cm,ysize=15cm". The dimensions are allowed to be negative
(a negative dimension results in a reflection).
For Plotters other than SVG and CGM Plotters, the position of the graph-
ics display on the page, relative to its default position, can be adjusted by
specifying an offset vector. For example, PAGESIZE could be specified as "let-
ter,yoffset=1.2in", or "a4,xoffset=−5mm,yoffset=2.0cm". Inches, centimeters,
and millimeters are the supported units. The "xoffset" and "yoffset" options
may be used in conjunction with "xsize" and "ysize".
It is also possible to position the graphics display precisely, by specifying the
location of its lower left corner relative to the lower left corner of the page. For
example, PAGESIZE could be specified as "letter,xorigin=2in,yorigin=3in", or
"a4,xorigin=0.5cm,yorigin=0.5cm". The "xorigin" and "yorigin" options may
be used in conjunction with "xsize" and "ysize". SVG and WebCGM Plotters
ignore the "xoffset", "yoffset", "xorigin", and "yorigin" options, since SVG
format and WebCGM format have no notion of the Web page on which the
graphics display will ultimately be positioned.
ROTATION (Default "0.0".) Relevant to all Plotters other than Metafile Plotters, which
have no output device. The angle, in degrees, by which the graphics display
(i.e., the viewport) should be rotated, relative to its default orientation. The
rotation is counterclockwise.
A rotated viewport does not change the position of its four corners. Rather,
the graphics are rotated within it. If the viewport is rectangular rather than
square, this ‘rotation’ necessarily includes a rescaling.
This parameter is useful for switching between portrait and landscape orienta-
tions. Internally, it determines the affine transformation from NDC (normalized
device coordinate) space to device space.
BG_COLOR (Default "white".) The initial background color of the graphics display, when
drawing each page of graphics. This is relevant to X Plotters, PNG Plotters,
PNM Plotters, GIF Plotters, CGM Plotters, ReGIS Plotters, and Metafile Plot-
ters; also to X Drawable Plotters (for the last, the background color shows up
only if erase is invoked). For information on what color names are recog-
nized, see Appendix B [Color Names], page 166. The background color may
be changed at any later time by invoking the bgcolor (or bgcolorname) and
erase operations.
SVG Plotters and CGM Plotters support "none" as a value for the background
color. It will turn off the background: the drawn objects will not be backed
by anything. This is useful when the generated SVG or WebCGM file is to be
placed on a Web page.
CGM_ENCODING
(Default "binary".) Relevant only to CGM Plotters. "binary" means that the
CGM output should use the binary encoding. "clear text" means that the CGM
output should use a human-readable encoding. The WebCGM profile requires
that the binary encoding be used, but many CGM viewers and interpreters
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 139

can also parse the clear text encoding. The third standard CGM encoding,
"character", is not currently supported.
CGM_MAX_VERSION
(Default "4".) Relevant only to CGM Plotters. An upper bound on the ver-
sion number of CGM format that is produced. Many older CGM interpreters
and viewers, such as the ones built into Microsoft Office and other commer-
cial software, only support version 1 CGM files. For fully adequate handling of
fonts and line styles, version 3 is necessary. By default, the present release of
libplot produces version 3 CGM files, i.e., it does not use version 4 features.
EMULATE_COLOR
(Default "no".) Relevant to all Plotters. "yes" means that each color in the
output should be replaced by an appropriate shade of gray. The well known
formula for CIE luminance, namely 0.212671R + 0.715160G + 0.072169B, is
used.
This parameter is seldom useful, except when using a PCL Plotter to prepare
output for a monochrome PCL 5 device. Many monochrome PCL 5 devices,
such as monochrome LaserJets, do a poor job of emulating color on their own.
They usually map HP-GL/2’s seven standard pen colors, including even yellow,
to black.
GIF_ANIMATION
(Default "yes".) Relevant only to GIF Plotters. "yes" means that the erase
operation will have special semantics: with the exception of its first invocation,
it will act as a separator between successive images in the written-out pseudo-
GIF file. "no" means that erase should act as it does on other Plotters that do
not write graphics in real time, i.e., it should erase the image under construction
by filling it with the background color. If "no" is specified, the pseudo-GIF file
will contain only a single image.
GIF_DELAY
(Default "0".) Relevant only to GIF Plotters. The delay, in hundredths of a
second, after each image in a written-out animated pseudo-GIF file. The value
should be an integer in the range "0". . . "65535".
GIF_ITERATIONS
(Default "0".) Relevant only to GIF Plotters. The number of times that an
animated pseudo-GIF file should be ‘looped’. The value should be an integer
in the range "0". . . "65535".
HPGL_ASSIGN_COLORS
(Default "no".) Relevant only to HP-GL Plotters, and only if the value of
HPGL_VERSION is "2". "no" means to draw with a fixed set of pens, specified
by setting the HPGL_PENS parameter. "yes" means that pen colors will not re-
stricted to the palette specified in HPGL_PENS: colors will be assigned to “logical
pens” in the range #1. . . #31, as needed. Other than color LaserJet printers
and DesignJet plotters, not many HP-GL/2 devices allow the assignment of
colors to logical pens. In particular, HP-GL/2 pen plotters do not. So this
parameter should be used with caution.
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 140

HPGL_OPAQUE_MODE
(Default "yes".) Relevant only to HP-GL Plotters, and only if the value of
HPGL_VERSION is "2". "yes" means that the HP-GL/2 output device should
be switched into opaque mode, rather than transparent mode. This allows
objects to be filled with opaque white and other opaque colors. It also allows
the drawing of visible white lines, which by convention are drawn with pen #0.
Not all HP-GL/2 devices support opaque mode or the use of pen #0 to draw
visible white lines. In particular, HP-GL/2 pen plotters do not. Some older
HP-GL/2 devices reportedly malfunction if asked to switch into opaque mode.
If the output of an HP-GL Plotter is to be sent to such a device, a "no" value
is recommended.
HPGL_PENS
(Default "1=black:2=red:3=green:4=yellow:5=blue:6=magenta:7=cyan" if the
value of HPGL_VERSION is "1.5" or "2" and "1=black" if the value of HPGL_
VERSION is "1". Relevant only to HP-GL Plotters. The set of available pens; the
format should be self-explanatory. The color for any pen in the range #1. . . #31
may be specified. For information on what color names are recognized, see
Appendix B [Color Names], page 166. Pen #1 must always be present, though
it need not be black. Any pen in the range #2. . . #31 may be omitted.
HPGL_ROTATE
(Default "0".) Relevant only to HP-GL Plotters. The angle, in degrees, by
which the graphics display (i.e., the viewport) should be rotated on the page
relative to the default orientation. Recognized values are "0", "90", "180", and
"270"; "no" and "yes" are equivalent to "0" and "90" respectively. "180" and
"270" are supported only if HPGL_VERSION is "2".
The rotation requested by HPGL_ROTATE is different from the sort requested by
the ROTATION parameter. ROTATION rotates the graphics display in place, but
HPGL_ROTATE both rotates the graphics display and moves its lower left corner
toward another corner of the page. Altering the plotting area in such a way is
supported by the HP-GL language.
The HPGL_ROTATE parameter facilitates switching between portrait and land-
scape orientations. For HP-GL devices that is frequently a concern, since some
HP-GL devices (“plotters”) draw with a default landscape orientation, while
others (“printers”) draw with a default portrait orientation. There is no pro-
grammatic way of determining which is which.
HPGL_VERSION
(Default "2".) Relevant only to HP-GL Plotters. "1" means that the output
should be generic HP-GL, "1.5" means that the output should be suitable for
the HP7550A graphics plotter and the HP758x, HP7595A and HP7596A draft-
ing plotters (HP-GL with some HP-GL/2 extensions), and "2" means that the
output should be modern HP-GL/2. If the version is less than "2" then the only
available fonts will be vector fonts, and all paths will be drawn with a default
thickness, so that invoking linewidth, capmod, joinmod, and fmiterlimit will
have no effect. Also, the ‘nonzero winding number rule’ will not be supported
when filling paths, so invoking fillmod will have no effect. Additionally, if the
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 141

version is "1" then the filling of arbitrary paths will not be supported (circles
and rectangles aligned with the coordinate axes may be filled, however).
INTERLACE
(Default "no".) Relevant only to PNG and GIF Plotters. If the value is "yes",
the output file will be interlaced. That means it will be displayed in an inter-
laced (nonlinear) way by many applications.
MAX_LINE_LENGTH
(Default "500".) The maximum number of defining points that a path may
have, before it is flushed to the output device. If this flushing occurs, the path
will be split into two or more sub-paths, though the splitting should not be
noticeable. Splitting will not be performed if the path is to be filled.
This parameter is relevant to all Plotters except Tektronix and Metafile Plot-
ters. The reason for splitting long paths is that some display devices (e.g., old
Postscript printers and HP-GL pen plotters) have limited buffer sizes. It is not
relevant to Tektronix or Metafile Plotters, since they draw paths in real time
and have no buffer limitations.
META_PORTABLE
(Default "no".) Relevant only to Metafile Plotters. "yes" means that the output
metafile should use a portable (human-readable) encoding of graphics, rather
than the default (binary) encoding. See Appendix D [Metafiles], page 169.
PCL_ASSIGN_COLORS
(Default "no".) Relevant only to PCL Plotters. "no" means to draw with a
fixed set of pens. "yes" means that pen colors will not restricted to this palette:
colors will be assigned to “logical pens”, as needed. Other than color LaserJet
printers, not many PCL 5 devices allow the assignment of colors to logical pens.
So this parameter should be used with caution.
PCL_BEZIERS
(Default "yes".) Relevant only to PCL Plotters. "yes" means that when draw-
ing Bezier curves, the special ‘Bezier instructions’ will be used. "no" means
that these instructions will not be used. Instead, each Bezier curve will be
approximated and drawn as a polygonal line. Other than the LaserJet III,
which was Hewlett–Packard’s first PCL 5 printer, all Hewlett–Packard’s PCL 5
printers support the Bezier instructions.
PNM_PORTABLE
(Default "no".) Relevant only to PNM Plotters. "yes" means that the output
should be in a portable (human-readable) version of PBM/PGM/PPM format,
rather than the default (binary) version. ‘Portable’ is something of a misnomer,
since binary PBM/PGM/PPM files are also portable, in the sense that they are
machine-independent.
TERM (Default NULL.) Relevant only to Tektronix Plotters. If the value is a string
beginning with "xterm", "nxterm", or "kterm", it is taken as a sign that the
current application is running in an X Window System VT100 terminal emula-
tor: an xterm, nxterm, or kterm. Before drawing graphics, a Tektronix Plotter
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 142

will emit an escape sequence that causes the terminal emulator’s auxiliary Tek-
tronix window, which is normally hidden, to pop up. After the graphics are
drawn, an escape sequence that returns control to the original VT100 window
will be emitted. The Tektronix window will remain on the screen.
If the value is a string beginning with "kermit", "ansi.sys", or "nansi.sys", it is
taken as a sign that the current application is running in the VT100 terminal
emulator provided by the MS-DOS version of kermit. Before drawing graph-
ics, a Tektronix Plotter will emit an escape sequence that switches the terminal
emulator to Tektronix mode. Also, some of the Tektronix control codes emit-
ted by the Plotter will be kermit-specific. There will be a limited amount of
color support, which is not normally the case (the 16 ansi.sys colors will be
supported). The "dotdotdashed" line style will be supported, which is also
not normally the case. After drawing graphics, the Plotter will emit an es-
cape sequence that returns the emulator to VT100 mode. The key sequence
‘ALT minus’ may be employed manually within kermit to switch between the
two modes.
TRANSPARENT_COLOR
(Default "none".) Relevant only to PNG and GIF Plotters. If the value is
a recognized color name, that color, if it appears in the output file, will be
treated as transparent by most applications. For information on what names
are recognized, see Appendix B [Color Names], page 166.
If TRANSPARENT_COLOR is set and an animated pseudo-GIF file is produced, the
‘restore to background’ disposal method will be used for each image in the file.
Otherwise, the ‘unspecified’ disposal method will be used.
USE_DOUBLE_BUFFERING
(Default "no".) Relevant only to X Plotters and X Drawable Plotters. If the
value is "yes", a double buffering scheme will be used when drawing graphics.
Each frame of graphics, within a openpl. . . closepl pair, will be written to an
off-screen buffer rather than to the Plotter’s display. When erase is invoked to
end a frame, or when closepl is invoked, the contents of the off-screen buffer
will be copied to the Plotter’s display, pixel by pixel. If successive frames differ
only slightly, this will create the illusion of smooth animation.
Some X displays provide special hardware support for double buffering. If this
support is available, the X Plotter will detect its presence, and will draw graph-
ics using the appropriate extension to the X11 protocol (either DBE or MBX).
In this case the animation will be significantly faster; on high-end graphics
hardware, at least.
VANISH_ON_DELETE
(Default "no".) Relevant only to X Plotters. If the value is "yes", when a
Plotter is deleted, the window or windows that it has popped up will vanish.
Otherwise, each such window will remain on the screen until it is removed by
the user (by typing ‘q’ in it, or by clicking with a mouse).
XDRAWABLE_COLORMAP
(Default NULL.) Relevant only to X Drawable Plotters. If the value is non-
NULL, it should be a Colormap *, a pointer to a colormap from which colors
Chapter 9: libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library 143

should be allocated. NULL indicates that the colormap to be used should be

the default colormap of the default screen of the X display.
XDRAWABLE_DISPLAY
(Default NULL.) Relevant only to X Drawable Plotters. The value should
be a Display *, a pointer to the X display with which the drawable(s) to be
drawn in are associated.
XDRAWABLE_DRAWABLE1
XDRAWABLE_DRAWABLE2
(Default NULL.) Relevant only to X Drawable Plotters. If set, the value of
each of these parameters should be a Drawable *, a pointer to a drawable to
be drawn in. A ‘drawable’ is either a window or a pixmap. At the time an
X Drawable Plotter is created, at least one of the two parameters must be set.
X Drawable Plotters support simultaneous drawing in two drawables because it
is often useful to be able to draw graphics simultaneously in both an X window
and its background pixmap. If two drawables are specified, they must have
the same dimensions and depth, and be associated with the same screen of the
X display.
XDRAWABLE_VISUAL
(Default NULL.) Relevant only to X Drawable Plotters. If set, the value should
be a Visual *, a pointer to the ‘visual’ with which the colormap (see above) is
associated. Setting this parameter is not required, but it is recommended that
it be set if XDRAWABLE_COLORMAP is set. Under some circumstances, that will
speed up color cell allocation.
X_AUTO_FLUSH
(Default "yes".) Relevant only to X Plotters. If the value is "yes", an XFlush
operation is performed after each drawing operation. That ensures that graph-
ics are flushed to the X Window System display, and are visible to the user,
immediately after they are drawn. However, it slows down rendering consider-
ably. If the value is "no", drawing is faster, since it does not take place in real
time.
Appendix A: Fonts, Strings, and Symbols 144

Appendix A Fonts, Strings, and Symbols

The GNU libplot graphics library and applications built on it, such as graph, plot,
pic2plot, tek2plot, and plotfont, can draw text strings in a wide variety of fonts. Text
strings may include characters from more than one font in a typeface, and may include
superscripts, subscripts, and square roots. A wide variety of marker symbols can also be
drawn. The following sections explain how to use these features.

A.1 Available text fonts

The GNU libplot library and applications built on it, such as graph, plot, pic2plot,
tek2plot, and plotfont, can use many fonts. These include 22 Hershey vector fonts,
35 Postscript fonts, 45 PCL 5 fonts, and 18 Hewlett–Packard vector fonts. We call these
120 supported fonts the ‘built-in’ fonts. The Hershey fonts are constructed from stroked
characters digitized c. 1967 by Dr. Allen V. Hershey at the U.S. Naval Surface Weapons
Center in Dahlgren, VA. The 35 Postscript fonts are the outline fonts resident in all modern
Postscript printers, and the 45 PCL 5 fonts are the outline fonts resident in modern Hewlett–
Packard LaserJet printers and plotters. (Of the PCL 5 fonts, the old LaserJet III, which
was Hewlett–Packard’s first PCL 5 printer, supported only eight: the Univers and CGTimes
fonts.) The 18 Hewlett–Packard vector fonts are fonts that are resident in Hewlett–Packard
printers and plotters (mostly the latter).
The Hershey fonts can be used by all types of Plotter supported by libplot, and the
Postscript fonts can be used by X, SVG, Illustrator, Postscript, and Fig Plotters. So, for
example, all variants of graph can use the Hershey fonts, and graph -T X, graph -T svg,
graph -T ai, graph -T ps, graph -T cgm and graph -T fig can use the Postscript fonts.
The PCL 5 fonts can be used by by SVG, Illustrator, PCL, and HP-GL Plotters, and
by graph -T svg, graph -T ai, graph -T pcl, and graph -T hpgl. The Hewlett–Packard
vector fonts can be used by PCL and HP-GL Plotters, and by graph -T pcl and graph -T
hpgl. X Plotters and graph -T X are not restricted to the built-in Hershey and Postscript
fonts. They can use any X Window System font.
The plotfont utility, which accepts the ‘-T’ option, will print a character map of any
font that is available in the specified output format. See Chapter 6 [plotfont], page 56.
For the purpose of plotting text strings (see Section A.4 [Text String Format], page 151),
the 120 built-in fonts are divided into typefaces. As you can see from the following tables,
our convention is that in any typeface with more than a single font, font #1 is the normal
font, font #2 is italic or oblique, font #3 is bold, and font #4 is bold italic or bold oblique.
Additional variants (if any) are numbered #5 and higher.
The 22 Hershey fonts are divided into typefaces as follows.
• HersheySerif
1. HersheySerif
2. HersheySerif-Italic
3. HersheySerif-Bold
4. HersheySerif-BoldItalic
5. HersheyCyrillic
6. HersheyCyrillic-Oblique
Appendix A: Fonts, Strings, and Symbols 145

7. HersheyEUC
• HersheySans
1. HersheySans
2. HersheySans-Oblique
3. HersheySans-Bold
4. HersheySans-BoldOblique
• HersheyScript
1. HersheyScript
2. HersheyScript
3. HersheyScript-Bold
4. HersheyScript-Bold
• HersheyGothicEnglish
• HersheyGothicGerman
• HersheyGothicItalian
• HersheySerifSymbol
1. HersheySerifSymbol
2. HersheySerifSymbol-Oblique
3. HersheySerifSymbol-Bold
4. HersheySerifSymbol-BoldOblique
• HersheySansSymbol
1. HersheySansSymbol
2. HersheySansSymbol-Oblique
Nearly all Hershey fonts except the Symbol fonts use the ISO-Latin-1 encoding, which is a
superset of ASCII. The Symbol fonts consist of Greek characters and mathematical sym-
bols, and use the symbol font encoding documented in the Postscript Language Reference
Manual. By convention, each Hershey typeface contains a symbol font (HersheySerifSymbol
or HersheySansSymbol, as appropriate) as font #0.
HersheyCyrillic, HersheyCyrillic-Oblique, and HersheyEUC (which is a Japanese font)
are the only non-Symbol Hershey fonts that do not use the ISO-Latin-1 encoding. For their
encodings, see Section A.2 [Cyrillic and Japanese], page 149.
The 35 Postscript fonts are divided into typefaces as follows.
• Helvetica
1. Helvetica
2. Helvetica-Oblique
3. Helvetica-Bold
4. Helvetica-BoldOblique
• Helvetica-Narrow
1. Helvetica-Narrow
2. Helvetica-Narrow-Oblique
Appendix A: Fonts, Strings, and Symbols 146

3. Helvetica-Narrow-Bold
4. Helvetica-Narrow-BoldOblique
• Times
1. Times-Roman
2. Times-Italic
3. Times-Bold
4. Times-BoldItalic
• AvantGarde
1. AvantGarde-Book
2. AvantGarde-BookOblique
3. AvantGarde-Demi
4. AvantGarde-DemiOblique
• Bookman
1. Bookman-Light
2. Bookman-LightItalic
3. Bookman-Demi
4. Bookman-DemiItalic
• Courier
1. Courier
2. Courier-Oblique
3. Courier-Bold
4. Courier-BoldOblique
• NewCenturySchlbk
1. NewCenturySchlbk-Roman
2. NewCenturySchlbk-Italic
3. NewCenturySchlbk-Bold
4. NewCenturySchlbk-BoldItalic
• Palatino
1. Palatino-Roman
2. Palatino-Italic
3. Palatino-Bold
4. Palatino-BoldItalic
• ZapfChancery-MediumItalic
• ZapfDingbats
• Symbol
All Postscript fonts except the ZapfDingbats and Symbol fonts use the ISO-Latin-1 encod-
ing. The encodings used by the ZapfDingbats and Symbol fonts are documented in the
Postscript Language Reference Manual. By convention, each Postscript typeface contains
the Symbol font as font #0.
The 45 PCL 5 fonts are divided into typefaces as follows.
Appendix A: Fonts, Strings, and Symbols 147

• Univers
1. Univers
2. Univers-Oblique
3. Univers-Bold
4. Univers-BoldOblique
• UniversCondensed
1. UniversCondensed
2. UniversCondensed-Oblique
3. UniversCondensed-Bold
4. UniversCondensed-BoldOblique
• CGTimes
1. CGTimes-Roman
2. CGTimes-Italic
3. CGTimes-Bold
4. CGTimes-BoldItalic
• Albertus
1. AlbertusMedium
2. AlbertusMedium
3. AlbertusExtraBold
4. AlbertusExtraBold
• AntiqueOlive
1. AntiqueOlive
2. AntiqueOlive-Italic
3. AntiqueOlive-Bold
• Arial
1. Arial-Roman
2. Arial-Italic
3. Arial-Bold
4. Arial-BoldItalic
• ClarendonCondensed
• Coronet
• Courier
1. Courier
2. Courier-Italic
3. Courier-Bold
4. Courier-BoldItalic
• Garamond
1. Garamond
2. Garamond-Italic
Appendix A: Fonts, Strings, and Symbols 148

3. Garamond-Bold
4. Garamond-BoldItalic
• LetterGothic
1. LetterGothic-Roman
2. LetterGothic-Italic
3. LetterGothic-Bold
4. LetterGothic-BoldItalic
• Marigold
• CGOmega
1. CGOmega-Roman
2. CGOmega-Italic
3. CGOmega-Bold
4. CGOmega-BoldItalic
• TimesNewRoman
1. TimesNewRoman
2. TimesNewRoman-Italic
3. TimesNewRoman-Bold
4. TimesNewRoman-BoldItalic
• Wingdings
• Symbol
All PCL 5 fonts except the Wingdings and Symbol fonts use the ISO-Latin-1 encoding. The
encoding used by the Symbol font is the symbol font encoding documented in the Postscript
Language Reference Manual. By convention, each PCL typeface contains the Symbol font
as font #0.
The 18 Hewlett–Packard vector fonts are divided into typefaces as follows.
• Arc
1. Arc
2. Arc-Oblique
3. Arc-Bold
4. Arc-BoldOblique
• Stick
1. Stick
2. Stick-Oblique
3. Stick-Bold
4. Stick-BoldOblique
• ArcANK
1. ArcANK*
2. ArcANK-Oblique*
3. ArcANK-Bold*
Appendix A: Fonts, Strings, and Symbols 149

4. ArcANK-BoldOblique*
• StickANK
1. StickANK*
2. StickANK-Oblique*
3. StickANK-Bold*
4. StickANK-BoldOblique*
• ArcSymbol*
• StickSymbol*
The Hewlett–Packard vector fonts with an asterisk (the ANK and Symbol fonts) are only
available when producing HP-GL/2 graphics, or HP-GL graphics for the HP7550A graphics
plotter and the HP758x, HP7595A and HP7596A drafting plotters. That is, they are
available only if HPGL_VERSION is "2" (the default) or "1.5". The ANK fonts are Japanese
fonts (see Section A.2 [Cyrillic and Japanese], page 149), and the Symbol fonts contain a
few miscellaneous mathematical symbols.
All Hewlett–Packard vector fonts except the ANK and Symbol fonts use the ISO-Latin-1
encoding. The Arc fonts are proportional (variable-width) fonts, and the Stick fonts are
fixed-width fonts. If HP-GL/2 or HP-GL output is selected, the Arc fonts are assumed
to be kerned via device-resident kerning tables. But when producing PCL 5 output, it is
assumed that the display device will do no kerning. Apparently Hewlett–Packard dropped
support for device-resident kerning tables when emulating HP-GL/2 from within PCL 5.
For information about Hewlett–Packard vector fonts and the way in which they are kerned
(in HP-GL pen plotters, at least), see the article by L. W. Hennessee et al. in the Nov. 1981
issue of the Hewlett–Packard Journal.
To what extent do the fonts supported by libplot contain ligatures? The Postscript
fonts, the PCL 5 fonts, and the Hewlett–Packard vector fonts, at least as implemented in
libplot, do not contain ligatures. However, six of the 22 Hershey fonts contain ligatures.
The character combinations "fi", "ff", "fl", "ffi", and "ffl" are automatically drawn as lig-
atures in HersheySerif and HersheySerif-Italic. (Also in the two HersheyCyrillic fonts and
HersheyEUC, since insofar as printable ASCII characters are concerned, they are identical
[or almost identical] to HersheySerif.) In addition, "tz" and "ch" are ligatures in Hershey-
GothicGerman. The German double-s character ‘ß’, which is called an ‘eszet’, is not treated
as a ligature in any font. To obtain an eszet, you must either request one with the escape
sequence "\ss" (see Section A.4 [Text String Format], page 151), or, if you have an 8-bit
keyboard, type an eszet explicitly.

A.2 Cyrillic and Japanese fonts

The built-in fonts discussed in the previous section include Cyrillic and Japanese vector
fonts. This section explains how these fonts are encoded, i.e., how their character maps
are laid out. You may use the plotfont utility to display the character map for any font,
including the Cyrillic and Japanese vector fonts. See Chapter 6 [plotfont], page 56.
The HersheyCyrillic and HersheyCyrillic-Oblique fonts use an encoding called KOI8-R, a
superset of ASCII that has become the de facto standard for Unix and networking applica-
tions in the former Soviet Union. Insofar as printable ASCII characters go, they resemble the
HersheySerif vector font. But their upper halves are different. The byte range 0xc0. . . 0xdf
Appendix A: Fonts, Strings, and Symbols 150

contains lower-case Cyrillic characters and the byte range 0xe0. . . 0xff contains upper case
Cyrillic characters. Additional Cyrillic characters are located at 0xa3 and 0xb3. For more
on the encoding scheme, see the official KOI8-R Web page and Internet RFC 1489, which
is available in many places, including Information Sciences Institute.
The HersheyEUC font is a vector font that is used for displaying Japanese text. It uses
the 8-bit EUC-JP encoding. EUC stands for ‘extended Unix code’, which is a scheme for
encoding Japanese, and also other character sets (e.g., Greek and Cyrillic) as multibyte
character strings. The format of EUC strings is explained in Ken Lunde’s Understanding
Japanese Information Processing (O’Reilly, 1993), which contains much additional infor-
mation on Japanese text processing. See also his on-line supplement, and his more recent
book CJKV Information Processing (O’Reilly, 1999).
In the HersheyEUC font, characters in the printable ASCII range, 0x20. . . 0x7e, are
similar to HersheySerif (their encoding is ‘JIS Roman’, an ASCII variant standardized by
the Japanese Industrial Standards Committee). Also, each successive pair of bytes in the
0xa1. . . 0xfe range defines a single character in the JIS X0208 standard. The characters
in the JIS X0208 standard include Japanese syllabic characters (Hiragana and Katakana),
ideographic characters (Kanji), Roman, Greek, and Cyrillic alphabets, punctuation marks,
and miscellaneous symbols. For example, the JIS X0208 standard indexes the 83 Hiragana
as 0x2421. . . 0x2473. To obtain the EUC code for any JIS X0208 character, you would add
0x80 to each byte (i.e., ‘set the high bit’ on each byte). So the first of the 83 Hiragana
(0x2421) would be encoded as the successive pair of bytes 0xa4 and 0xa1.
The implementation of the JIS X0208 standard in the HersheyEUC font is based on
Dr. Hershey’s digitizations, and is complete enough to be useful. All 83 Hiragana and 86
Katakana are available, though the little-used ‘half-width Katakana’ are not supported.
Also, 603 Kanji are available, including 596 of the 2965 JIS Level 1 (i.e., frequently used)
Kanji. The Hiragana, the Katakana, and the available Kanji all have the same width.
The file ‘kanji.doc’, which on most systems is installed in ‘/usr/share/libplot’ or
‘/usr/local/share/libplot’, lists the 603 available Kanji. Each JIS X0208 character
that is unavailable will be drawn as an ‘undefined character’ glyph (a bundle of horizontal
lines).
The eight Hewlett–Packard vector fonts in the ArcANK and StickANK typefaces are also
used for displaying Japanese text. They are available when producing HP-GL/2 output, or
HP-GL output for the HP7550A graphics plotter and the HP758x, HP7595A and HP7596A
drafting plotters. That is, they are available only if HPGL_VERSION is "2" (the default)
or "1.5".
ANK stands for Alphabet, Numerals, and Katakana. The ANK fonts use a special mixed
encoding. The lower half of each font uses the JIS Roman encoding, and the upper half
contains half-width Katakana. Half-width Katakana are simplified Katakana that may need
to be equipped with diacritical marks. The diacritical marks are included in the encoding
as separate characters.

A.3 Available text fonts for the X Window System

The command-line graphics programs graph -T X, plot -T X, pic2plot -T X, tek2plot
-T X, and plotfont -T X, and the libplot library that they are built on, can draw text on
an X Window System display in a wide variety of fonts. This includes the 22 built-in Hershey
Appendix A: Fonts, Strings, and Symbols 151

vector fonts. They can use the 35 built-in Postscript fonts too, if those fonts are available
on the X display. Most releases of the plotting utilities include freely distributable versions
of the 35 Postscript fonts, in Type 1 format, that are easily installed on any X display.
The plotting utilities can in fact use most of the ‘core’ fonts that are available on the
X display. This includes scalable fonts that have so-called XLFD (X Logical Font Descrip-
tion) names. You may determine which such fonts are available by using the low-level
xlsfonts command. Fonts whose names end in "-0-0-0-0-p-0-iso8859-1" or "-0-0-0-0-m-
0-iso8859-1" are scalable ISO-Latin-1 fonts that can be used by libplot and the plotting
utilities. For example, the "CharterBT-Roman" font is available on many X displays. Its
full XLFD name is "-bitstream-charter-medium-r-normal–0-0-0-0-p-0-iso8859-1". The plot-
ting utilities would refer to it by its base XLFD name, which has only three hyphens;
namely, "charter-medium-r-normal". The command
echo 0 0 1 1 2 0 | graph -T X -F charter-medium-r-normal
will draw a plot in a popped-up X window, in which the axis ticks are labeled in this font.
Fonts whose names end in "iso8859-2", etc., and "adobe-fontspecific", may also be used,
though they do not employ the standard ISO-Latin-1 encoding. By default libplot will
try to retrieve an "iso8859-1", i.e., ISO-Latin-1 version of the font, if one is available. But
you can work around this by giving the full name of the font, if you wish. Supplying the full
name of an X font is also useful if you wish to employ a screen font (i.e., bitmap font), such
as the traditional fonts "fixed" and "9x15". If you supply the full name of an X font, rather
than a base XLFD name, each character glyph, once it is obtained from the X display as a
pattern of pixels, will be scaled by libplot to the appropriate size.
The plotting utilities, including graph, support a ‘--bitmap-size’ option. If the ‘-T X’
option is used, it sets the size of the popped-up X Window. You may use it to obtain
some interesting visual effects. Each of the plotting utilities assumes that it is drawing
in a square region, so if you use the ‘--bitmap-size 800x400’ option, your plot will be
scaled anisotropically, by a larger factor in the horizontal direction than in the vertical
direction. The X fonts in the plot will be scaled accordingly. In the same spirit, the
‘--rotation’ option will rotate the plot, causing all text strings to be rotated too. For
example, ‘--rotation 45’ will induce a 45-degree counterclockwise rotation. The options
‘--bitmap-size’ and ‘--rotation’ may be applied together.
The escape sequences that provide access to the non-ASCII ‘8-bit’ characters in the built-
in ISO-Latin-1 fonts may be employed when using any ISO-Latin-1 X Window System font.
For more on escape sequences, see Section A.4 [Text String Format], page 151. As an
example, "\Po" will yield the British pounds sterling symbol ‘£’. The command
echo 0 0 1 1 | graph -T X -F times-medium-r-normal -L "A \Po1 Plot"
shows how this symbol could be used in a graph label. In the same way, the escape sequences
that provide access to mathematical symbols and Greek characters may be employed when
using any X Window System font, whether or not it is an ISO-Latin-1 font. These symbols
and characters are taken from the Symbol font, which is available on nearly all X displays.

A.4 Text string format and escape sequences

Text strings that are drawn by the GNU libplot library and by applications built on it,
such as graph, plot, pic2plot, tek2plot, and plotfont, must consist of printable char-
Appendix A: Fonts, Strings, and Symbols 152

acters. No embedded control characters, such as newlines or carriage returns, are al-
lowed. Technically, a character is ‘printable’ if it comes from either of the two byte ranges
0x20. . . 0x7e and 0xa0. . . 0xff. The former is the printable ASCII range and the latter is
the printable ‘8-bit’ range.
Text strings may, however, include embedded ‘escape sequences’ that shift the font,
append subscripts or superscripts, or include non-ASCII characters and mathematical sym-
bols. As a consequence, the axis labels on a plot prepared with graph may include such
features. So may the text strings that pic2plot uses to label objects.
The format of the escape sequences should look familiar to anyone who is familiar with
the TEX, troff, or groff document formatters. Each escape sequence consists of three
characters: a backslash and two additional characters. The most frequently used escape
sequences are as follows.
"\sp" start superscript mode
"\ep" end superscript mode
"\sb" start subscript mode
"\eb" end subscript mode
"\mk" mark position
"\rt" return to marked position
For example, the string "x\sp2\ep" would be interpreted as ‘x squared’. Subscripts on sub-
scripts, etc., are allowed. Subscripts and superscripts may be vertically aligned by judicious
use of the "\mk" and "\rt" escape sequences. For example, "a\mk\sbi\eb\rt\sp2\ep"
produces "a sub i squared", with the exponent ‘2’ placed immediately above the subscript.
There are also escape sequences that switch from font to font within a typeface. For
an enumeration of the fonts within each typeface, see Section A.1 [Text Fonts], page 144.
Suppose for example that the current font is Times-Roman, which is font #1 in the ‘Times’
typeface. The string "A \f2very\f1 well labeled axis" would be a string in which the word
‘very’ appears in Times-Italic rather than Times-Roman. That is because Times-Italic is
the #2 font in the typeface. Font-switching escape sequences are of the form "\fn", where
n is the number of the font to be switched to. For compatibility with troff and groff,
"\fR", "\fI", "\fB" are equivalent to "\f1", "\f2", "\f3", respectively. "\fP" will switch
the font to the previously used font (only one font is remembered). There is currently no
support for switching between fonts in different typefaces.
There are also a few escape sequences for horizontal shifts, which are useful for improving
horizontal alignment, such as when shifting between italic and non-italic fonts. "\r1", "\r2",
"\r4", "\r6", "\r8", and "\r^" are escape sequences that shift right by 1 em, 1/2 em, 1/4
em, 1/6 em, 1/8 em, and 1/12 em, respectively. "\l1", "\l2", "\l4", "\l6", "\l8", and "\l^"
are similar, but shift left instead of right. "A \fIvery\r^\fP well labeled axis" would look
slightly better than "A \fIvery\fP well labeled axis".
Square roots are handled with the aid of a special pair of escape sequences, together
with the "\mk" and "\rt" sequences discussed above. A square root symbol is begun with
"\sr", and continued arbitrarily far to the right with the overbar (‘run’) escape sequence,
"\rn". For example, the string "\sr\mk\rn\rn\rtab" would be plotted as ‘the square root
Appendix A: Fonts, Strings, and Symbols 153

of ab’. To adjust the length of the overbar, you may need to experiment with the number
of times "\rn" appears.
To underline a string, you would use "\ul", the underline escape sequence, one or more
times. The "\mk". . . "\rt" trick would be employed in the same way. So, for example,
"\mk\ul\ul\ul\rtabc" would yield an underlined "abc". To adjust the length of the un-
derline, you may need to experiment with the number of times "\ul" appears. You may
also need to use one or more of the abovementioned horizontal shifts. For example, if the
"HersheySerif" font were used, "\mk\ul\ul\l8\ul\rtabc" would yield a better underline
than "\mk\ul\ul\ul\rtabc".
Besides the preceding escape sequences, there are also escape sequences for the print-
able non-ASCII characters in each of the built-in ISO-Latin-1 fonts (which means in every
built-in font, except for the symbol fonts, the HersheyCyrillic fonts, HersheyEUC, and
ZapfDingbats). The useful non-ASCII characters include accented characters among oth-
ers. Such ‘8-bit’ characters, in the 0xa0. . . 0xff byte range, may be included directly in a
text string. But if your terminal does not permit this, you may use the escape sequences
for them instead.
There are escape sequences for the mathematical symbols and Greek characters in the
symbol fonts, as well. This is how the symbol fonts are usually accessed. Which symbol font
the mathematical symbols and Greek characters are taken from depends on whether your
current font is a Hershey font or a non-Hershey font. They are taken from the Hershey-
SerifSymbol font or the HersheySansSymbol font in the former case, and from the Symbol
font in the latter.
The following are the escape sequences that provide access to the non-ASCII characters
of the current font, provided that it is an ISO-Latin-1 font. Each escape sequence is followed
by the position of the corresponding character in the ISO-Latin-1 encoding (in decimal),
and the official Postscript name of the character. Most names should be self-explanatory.
For example, ‘eacute’ is a lower-case ‘e’, equipped with an acute accent.
"\r!" [161] exclamdown
"\ct" [162] cent
"\Po" [163] sterling
"\Cs" [164] currency
"\Ye" [165] yen
"\bb" [166] brokenbar
"\sc" [167] section
"\ad" [168] dieresis
"\co" [169] copyright
"\Of" [170] ordfeminine
"\Fo" [171] guillemotleft
"\no" [172] logicalnot
"\hy" [173] hyphen
Appendix A: Fonts, Strings, and Symbols 154

"\rg" [174] registered

"\a-" [175] macron
"\de" [176] degree
"\+-" [177] plusminus
"\S2" [178] twosuperior
"\S3" [179] threesuperior
"\aa" [180] acute
"\*m" [181] mu
"\ps" [182] paragraph
"\md" [183] periodcentered
"\ac" [184] cedilla
"\S1" [185] onesuperior
"\Om" [186] ordmasculine
"\Fc" [187] guillemotright
"\14" [188] onequarter
"\12" [189] onehalf
"\34" [190] threequarters
"\r?" [191] questiondown
"\‘A" [192] Agrave
"\’A" [193] Aacute
"\^A" [194] Acircumflex
"\~A" [195] Atilde
"\:A" [196] Adieresis
"\oA" [197] Aring
"\AE" [198] AE
"\,C" [199] Ccedilla
"\‘E" [200] Egrave
"\’E" [201] Eacute
"\^E" [202] Ecircumflex
"\:E" [203] Edieresis
"\‘I" [204] Igrave
"\’I" [205] Iacute
"\^I" [206] Icircumflex
Appendix A: Fonts, Strings, and Symbols 155

"\:I" [207] Idieresis

"\-D" [208] Eth
"\~N" [209] Ntilde
"\’O" [210] Ograve
"\’O" [211] Oacute
"\^O" [212] Ocircumflex
"\~O" [213] Otilde
"\:O" [214] Odieresis
"\mu" [215] multiply
"\/O" [216] Oslash
"\‘U" [217] Ugrave
"\’U" [218] Uacute
"\^U" [219] Ucircumflex
"\:U" [220] Udieresis
"\’Y" [221] Yacute
"\TP" [222] Thorn
"\ss" [223] germandbls
"\‘a" [224] agrave
"\’a" [225] aacute
"\^a" [226] acircumflex
"\~a" [227] atilde
"\:a" [228] adieresis
"\oa" [229] aring
"\ae" [230] ae
"\,c" [231] ccedilla
"\‘e" [232] egrave
"\’e" [233] eacute
"\^e" [234] ecircumflex
"\:e" [235] edieresis
"\‘i" [236] igrave
"\’i" [237] iacute
"\^i" [238] icircumflex
"\:i" [239] idieresis
Appendix A: Fonts, Strings, and Symbols 156

"\Sd" [240] eth

"\~n" [241] ntilde
"\‘o" [242] ograve
"\’o" [243] oacute
"\^o" [244] ocircumflex
"\~o" [245] otilde
"\:o" [246] odieresis
"\di" [247] divide
"\/o" [248] oslash
"\‘u" [249] ugrave
"\’u" [250] uacute
"\^u" [251] ucircumflex
"\:u" [252] udieresis
"\’y" [253] yacute
"\Tp" [254] thorn
"\:y" [255] ydieresis
The following are the escape sequences that provide access to mathematical symbols
and Greek characters in the current symbol font, whether HersheySerifSymbol or Hershey-
SansSymbol (for Hershey fonts) or Symbol (for Postscript fonts). Each escape sequence is
followed by the position (in octal) of the corresponding character in the symbol encoding,
and the official Postscript name of the character. Many escape sequences and names should
be self-explanatory. "\*a" represents a lower-case Greek alpha, for example. For a table
displaying each of the characters below, see the Postscript Language Reference Manual.
"\fa" [0042] universal
"\te" [0044] existential
"\st" [0047] suchthat
"\**" [0052] asteriskmath
"\=~" [0100] congruent
"\*A" [0101] Alpha
"\*B" [0102] Beta
"\*X" [0103] Chi
"\*D" [0104] Delta
"\*E" [0105] Epsilon
"\*F" [0106] Phi
"\*G" [0107] Gamma
Appendix A: Fonts, Strings, and Symbols 157

"\*Y" [0110] Eta

"\*I" [0111] Iota
"\+h" [0112] theta1
"\*K" [0113] Kappa
"\*L" [0114] Lambda
"\*M" [0115] Mu
"\*N" [0116] Nu
"\*O" [0117] Omicron
"\*P" [0120] Pi
"\*H" [0121] Theta
"\*R" [0122] Rho
"\*S" [0123] Sigma
"\*T" [0124] Tau
"\*U" [0125] Upsilon
"\ts" [0126] sigma1
"\*W" [0127] Omega
"\*C" [0130] Xi
"\*Q" [0131] Psi
"\*Z" [0132] Zeta
"\tf" [0134] therefore
"\pp" [0136] perpendicular
"\ul" [0137] underline
"\rx" [0140] radicalex
"\*a" [0141] alpha
"\*b" [0142] beta
"\*x" [0143] chi
"\*d" [0144] delta
"\*e" [0145] epsilon
"\*f" [0146] phi
"\*g" [0147] gamma
"\*y" [0150] eta
"\*i" [0151] iota
"\+f" [0152] phi1
Appendix A: Fonts, Strings, and Symbols 158

"\*k" [0153] kappa

"\*l" [0154] lambda
"\*m" [0155] mu
"\*n" [0156] nu
"\*o" [0157] omicron
"\*p" [0160] pi
"\*h" [0161] theta
"\*r" [0162] rho
"\*s" [0163] sigma
"\*t" [0164] tau
"\*u" [0165] upsilon
"\+p" [0166] omega1
"\*w" [0167] omega
"\*c" [0170] xi
"\*q" [0171] psi
"\*z" [0172] zeta
"\ap" [0176] similar
"\+U" [0241] Upsilon1
"\fm" [0242] minute
"\<=" [0243] lessequal
"\f/" [0244] fraction
"\if" [0245] infinity
"\Fn" [0246] florin
"\CL" [0247] club
"\DI" [0250] diamond
"\HE" [0251] heart
"\SP" [0252] spade
"\<>" [0253] arrowboth
"\<-" [0254] arrowleft
"\ua" [0255] arrowup
"\->" [0256] arrowright
"\da" [0257] arrowdown
"\de" [0260] degree
Appendix A: Fonts, Strings, and Symbols 159

"\+-" [0261] plusminus

"\sd" [0262] second
"\>=" [0263] greaterequal
"\mu" [0264] multiply
"\pt" [0265] proportional
"\pd" [0266] partialdiff
"\bu" [0267] bullet
"\di" [0270] divide
"\!=" [0271] notequal
"\==" [0272] equivalence
"\~~" [0273] approxequal
"\.." [0274] ellipsis
NONE [0275] arrowvertex
"\an" [0276] arrowhorizex
"\CR" [0277] carriagereturn
"\Ah" [0300] aleph
"\Im" [0301] Ifraktur
"\Re" [0302] Rfraktur
"\wp" [0303] weierstrass
"\c*" [0304] circlemultiply
"\c+" [0305] circleplus
"\es" [0306] emptyset
"\ca" [0307] cap
"\cu" [0310] cup
"\SS" [0311] superset
"\ip" [0312] reflexsuperset
"\n<" [0313] notsubset
"\SB" [0314] subset
"\ib" [0315] reflexsubset
"\mo" [0316] element
"\nm" [0317] notelement
"\/ " [0320] angle
"\gr" [0321] nabla
Appendix A: Fonts, Strings, and Symbols 160

"\rg" [0322] registerserif

"\co" [0323] copyrightserif
"\tm" [0324] trademarkserif
"\PR" [0325] product
"\sr" [0326] radical
"\md" [0327] dotmath
"\no" [0330] logicalnot
"\AN" [0331] logicaland
"\OR" [0332] logicalor
"\hA" [0333] arrowdblboth
"\lA" [0334] arrowdblleft
"\uA" [0335] arrowdblup
"\rA" [0336] arrowdblright
"\dA" [0337] arrowdbldown
"\lz" [0340] lozenge
"\la" [0341] angleleft
"\RG" [0342] registersans
"\CO" [0343] copyrightsans
"\TM" [0344] trademarksans
"\SU" [0345] summation
NONE [0346] parenlefttp
NONE [0347] parenleftex
NONE [0350] parenleftbt
"\lc" [0351] bracketlefttp
NONE [0352] bracketleftex
"\lf" [0353] bracketleftbt
"\lt" [0354] bracelefttp
"\lk" [0355] braceleftmid
"\lb" [0356] braceleftbt
"\bv" [0357] braceex
"\eu" [0360] euro
"\ra" [0361] angleright
"\is" [0362] integral
Appendix A: Fonts, Strings, and Symbols 161

NONE [0363] integraltp

NONE [0364] integralex
NONE [0365] integralbt
NONE [0366] parenrighttp
NONE [0367] parenrightex
NONE [0370] parenrightbt
"\rc" [0371] bracketrighttp
NONE [0372] bracketrightex
"\rf" [0373] bracketrightbt
"\RT" [0374] bracerighttp
"\rk" [0375] bracerightmid
"\rb" [0376] bracerightbt
Finally, there are escape sequences that apply only if the current font is a Hershey font.
Most of these escape sequences provide access to special symbols that belong to no font,
and are accessible by no other means. These symbols are of two sorts: miscellaneous, and
astronomical or zodiacal. The escape sequences for the miscellaneous symbols are as follows.
"\dd" daggerdbl
"\dg" dagger
"\hb" hbar
"\li" lineintegral
"\IB" interbang
"\Lb" lambdabar
"\~-" modifiedcongruent
"\-+" minusplus
"\||" parallel
"\s-" [variant form of s]
The final escape sequence in the table above, "\s-", yields a letter rather than a symbol.
It is provided because in some Hershey fonts, the shape of the lower-case letter ‘s’ differs if
it is the last letter in a word. This is the case for HersheyGothicGerman. The German word
"besonders", for example, should be written as "besonder\s-" if it is to be rendered correctly
in this font. The same is true for the two Hershey symbol fonts, with their Greek alphabets
(in Greek text, lower-case final ‘s’ is different from lower-case non-final ‘s’). In Hershey fonts
where there is no distinction between final and non-final ‘s’, "s" and "\s-" are equivalent.
The escape sequences for the astronomical symbols, including the signs for the twelve
constellations of the zodiac, are listed in the following table. We stress that that like the
preceding miscellaneous escape sequences, they apply only if the current font is a Hershey
font.
Appendix A: Fonts, Strings, and Symbols 162

"\SO" sun
"\ME" mercury
"\VE" venus
"\EA" earth
"\MA" mars
"\JU" jupiter
"\SA" saturn
"\UR" uranus
"\NE" neptune
"\PL" pluto
"\LU" moon
"\CT" comet
"\ST" star
"\AS" ascendingnode
"\DE" descendingnode
"\AR" aries
"\TA" taurus
"\GE" gemini
"\CA" cancer
"\LE" leo
"\VI" virgo
"\LI" libra
"\SC" scorpio
"\SG" sagittarius
"\CP" capricornus
"\AQ" aquarius
"\PI" pisces
The preceding miscellaneous and astronomical symbols are not the only special non-
font symbols that can be used if the current font is a Hershey font. The entire library
of glyphs digitized by Allen Hershey is built into GNU libplot. So text strings may in-
clude any Hershey glyph. Each of the available Hershey glyphs is identified by a four-digit
number. Standard Hershey glyph #1 would be specified as "\#H0001". The standard
Hershey glyphs range from "\#H0001" to "\#H3999", with a number of gaps. Some addi-
tional glyphs designed by others appear in the "\#H4000". . . "\#H4194" range. Syllabic
Japanese characters (Kana) are located in the "\#H4195". . . "\#H4399" range.
Appendix A: Fonts, Strings, and Symbols 163

You may order a table of nearly all the Hershey glyphs in the "\#H0001". . . "\#H3999"
range from the U.S. National Technical Information Service, at +1 703 487 4650. Ask for
item number PB251845; the current price is about US$40. By way of example, the string
"\#H0744\#H0745\#H0001\#H0002\#H0003\#H0869\#H0907\#H2330\#H2331"
when drawn will display a shamrock, a fleur-de-lys, cartographic (small) letters A, B, C,
a bell, a large circle, a treble clef, and a bass clef. Again, this assumes that the current font
is a Hershey font.
You may also use Japanese syllabic characters (Hiragana and Katakana) and ideographic
characters (Kanji) when drawing strings in any Hershey font. In all, 603 Kanji are avail-
able; these are the same Kanji that are available in the HersheyEUC font. The Japanese
characters are indexed according to the JIS X0208 standard for Japanese typography, which
represents each character by a two-byte sequence. The file ‘kanji.doc’, which is distributed
along with the GNU plotting utilities, lists the available Kanji. On most systems it is in-
stalled in ‘/usr/share/libplot’ or ‘/usr/local/share/libplot’.
Each JIS X0208 character would be specified by an escape sequence which expresses
this two-byte sequence as four hexadecimal digits, such as "\#J357e". Both bytes must
be in the 0x21. . . 0x7e range in order to define a JIS X0208 character. Kanji are lo-
cated at "\#J3021" and above. Characters appearing elsewhere in the JIS X0208 encod-
ing may be accessed similarly. For example, Hiragana and Katakana are located in the
"\#J2421". . . "\#J257e" range, and Roman characters in the "\#J2321". . . "\#J237e"
range. The file ‘kana.doc’, which is installed in the same directory as ‘kanji.doc’, lists the
encodings of the Hiragana and Katakana. For more on the JIS X0208 standard, see Ken
Lunde’s Understanding Japanese Information Processing (O’Reilly, 1993), and his on-line
supplement.
The Kanji numbering used in A. N. Nelson’s Modern Reader’s Japanese-English Char-
acter Dictionary, a longtime standard, is also supported. (This dictionary is published by
C. E. Tuttle and Co., with ISBN 0-8048-0408-7. A revised edition [ISBN 0-8048-2036-8]
appeared in 1997, but uses a different numbering.) ‘Nelson’ escape sequences for Kanji are
similar to JIS X0208 escape sequences, but use four decimal instead of four hexadecimal
digits. The file ‘kanji.doc’ gives the correspondence between the JIS numbering scheme
and the Nelson numbering scheme. For example, "\#N0001" is equivalent to "\#J306c".
It also gives the positions of the available Kanji in the Unicode encoding.
All available Kanji have the same width, which is the same as that of the syllabic
Japanese characters (Hiragana and Katakana). Each Kanji that is not available will print
as an ‘undefined character’ glyph (a bundle of horizontal lines). The same is true for non-
Kanji JIS X0208 characters that are not available.

A.5 Available marker symbols

The GNU libplot library supports a standard set of marker symbols, numbered 0. . . 31.
A marker symbol is a visual representation of a point. The libplot marker symbols are
the symbols that the graph program will plot at each point of a dataset, if the ‘-S’ option
is specified.
Like a text string, a marker symbol has a font size. In any output format, a marker
symbol is guaranteed to be visible if its font size is sufficiently large. Marker symbol #0 is
Appendix A: Fonts, Strings, and Symbols 164

an exception to this: by convention, symbol #0 means no symbol at all. Marker symbols

in the range 1. . . 31 are defined as follows.
1. dot ( · )
2. plus (+)
3. asterisk (∗)
4. circle (◦)
5. cross (×)
6. square
7. triangle
8. diamond
9. star
10. inverted triangle
11. starburst
12. fancy plus
13. fancy cross
14. fancy square
15. fancy diamond
16. filled circle
17. filled square
18. filled triangle
19. filled diamond
20. filled inverted triangle
21. filled fancy square
22. filled fancy diamond
23. half filled circle
24. half filled square
25. half filled triangle
26. half filled diamond
27. half filled inverted triangle
28. half filled fancy square
29. half filled fancy diamond
30. octagon
31. filled octagon
The interpretation of marker symbols 1 through 5 is the same as in the well known Graphical
Kernel System (GKS).
By convention, symbols 32 and up are interpreted as characters in a certain text font.
For libplot, this is simply the current font. But for the graph program, it is the symbol
font selected with the ‘--symbol-font-name’ option. By default, the symbol font is the
ZapfDingbats font except in graph -T png, graph -T pnm, graph -T gif, graph -T pcl,
Appendix A: Fonts, Strings, and Symbols 165

graph -T hpgl and graph -T tek. Those variants of graph normally have no access to
ZapfDingbats and other Postscript fonts, so they use the HersheySerif font instead.
Many of the characters in the ZapfDingbats font are suitable for use as marker symbols.
For example, character #74 is the Texas star. Doing
echo 0 0 1 2 2 1 3 2 4 0 | graph -T ps -m 0 -S 74 0.1 > plot.ps
will produce a Postscript plot consisting of five data points, not joined by line segments.
Each data point will be marked by a Texas star, of a large font size (0.1 times the width of
the plotting box).
If you are using graph -T pcl or graph -T hpgl and wish to use font characters as
marker symbols, you should consider using the Wingdings font, which is available when
producing PCL 5 or HP-GL/2 output. Doing
echo 0 0 1 2 2 1 3 2 4 0 |
graph -T pcl -m 0 --symbol-font Wingdings -S 181 0.1 > plot.pcl
will produce a PCL 5 plot that is similar to the preceding Postscript plot. The Wingdings
font has the Texas star in location #181.
Appendix B: Specifying Colors by Name 166

Appendix B Specifying Colors by Name

The GNU libplot library allows colors to be specified by the user. It includes the
bgcolorname, pencolorname, and fillcolorname functions, each of which takes a color as
an argument.
The command-line graphics programs built on libplot, namely graph, plot, pic2plot,
tek2plot, and plotfont, allow colors to be specified on the command line. Each of
them supports a ‘--bg-color’ option, and each of them, other than graph, supports a
‘--pen-color’ option. (graph supports a more complicated ‘--pen-colors’ option, and a
‘--frame-color’ option.)
In any of these contexts, a color may be specified precisely as a hexadecimal string
that gives by its 48-bit RGB representation. For example, "#c0c0c0" is a silvery gray,
and "#ffffff" is white. Also, colors may be specified by name. 665 distinct names are
recognized, including familiar ones like "red", "green", and "blue", and obscure ones like
"dark magenta", "forest green", and "olive drab". Color names are case-insensitive, and
spaces are ignored. So, for example, "RosyBrown" is equivalent to "rosy brown", and
"DarkGoldenrod3" to "dark goldenrod 3".
The file ‘colors.txt’, which is distributed along with the GNU plotting utilities, lists
the 665 recognized color names. On most systems it is installed in ‘/usr/share/libplot’
or ‘/usr/local/share/libplot’. The names are essentially those recognized by
recent releases of the X Window System, which on most machines are listed in the file
‘/usr/lib/X11/rgb.txt’. However, for every color name containing the string "gray",
a version containing "grey" has been included. For example, both "dark slate gray 4" and
"dark slate grey 4" are recognized color names.
Appendix C: Page Sizes and Viewport Sizes 167

Appendix C Page Sizes and Viewport Sizes

When producing output in such vector formats as Illustrator, Postscript, PCL 5, HP-GL,
and Fig, it is important to specify the size of the page on which the output will appear.
Supported page sizes are "letter", "a4", etc.; a full list appears below. The page size is
passed to the the GNU libplot library via the PAGESIZE parameter. The command-line
graphics programs graph, plot, pic2plot, tek2plot, and plotfont, which are built on
libplot, similarly support a PAGESIZE environment variable and a ‘--page-size’ option.
Graphics drawn by libplot are nominally drawn within a graphics display, or ‘viewport’.
When producing raster formats such as PNG, PNM, and pseudo-GIF, the viewport is simply
a square or rectangular bitmap. But when producing vector formats such as Illustrator,
Postscript, PCL 5, HP-GL, and Fig format, the viewport is a square or rectangular region
on the output page. (For the meaning of the viewport when the output format is SVG or
WebCGM, see below.) Except in the HP-GL case, the viewport will by default be centered
on the page. For example, if the page size is "letter", the viewport will be a square 8 in
by 8 in region, centered on a 8.5 in by 11.0 in page. Graphics will not be clipped to the
viewport, so the entire page will in principle be imageable.
Either or both of the dimensions of the viewport can be changed by the user. For exam-
ple, the page size could be specified as "letter,xsize=4in", or "a4,xsize=10cm,ysize=15cm",
where the specified sizes will override the default dimensions of the viewport. The dimen-
sions of the viewport are allowed to be negative (a negative dimension results in a reflection).
Inches, centimeters, and millimeters are the supported units.
For most vector output formats, it is possible to position the viewport quite precisely,
by specifying the location of its lower left corner relative to the lower left corner of the
page. For example, the page size could be specified not merely as "letter" or "a4", but as
"letter,xorigin=2in,yorigin=3in", or "a4,xorigin=0.5cm,yorigin=0.5cm". (The ‘xorigin’ and
‘yorigin’ specifiers may be used in conjunction with ‘xsize’ and ‘ysize’.) As an alternative to
‘xorigin’ and ‘yorigin’, the viewport position could be adjusted by supplying an offset vector,
the offset being interpreted as a shift away from the default position. For example, the page
size could be specified as "letter,yoffset=1.2in", or "a4,xoffset=−5mm,yoffset=2.0cm". The
viewport may also be rotated, by setting the ROTATION parameter or environment variable,
or (in the case of the graphics programs) by using the ‘--rotation’ option. A rotated
viewport does not change the position of its four corners. Rather, the graphics are rotated
within it. If the viewport is rectangular rather than square, this ‘rotation’ will necessarily
include a rescaling.
Any ISO page size in the range "a0". . . "a4" or ANSI page size in the range "a". . . "e"
may be specified. ("letter" is an alias for "a", which is the default, and "tabloid" is an
alias for "b"). "legal", "ledger", and the JIS [Japanese Industrial Standard] size "b5" are
recognized also. The following are the supported page sizes and the default square viewport
size that corresponds to each.
"a" (or "letter"; 8.5 in by 11.0 in)
8.0 in
"b" (or "tabloid"; 11.0 in by 17.0 in)
10.0 in
Appendix C: Page Sizes and Viewport Sizes 168

"c" (17.0 in by 22.0 in)

16.0 in
"d" (22.0 in by 34.0 in)
20.0 in
"e" (34.0 in by 44.0 in)
32.0 in
"legal" (8.5 in by 14.0 in)
8.0 in
"ledger" (17.0 in by 11.0 in)
10.0 in
"a4" (21.0 cm by 29.7 cm)
19.81 cm
"a3" (29.7 cm by 42.0 cm)
27.18 cm
"a2" (42.0 cm by 59.4 cm)
39.62 cm
"a1" (59.4 cm by 84.1 cm)
56.90 cm
"a0" (84.1 cm by 118.9 cm)
81.79 cm
"b5" (18.2 cm by 25.7 cm)
16.94 cm
As noted, SVG and WebCGM format are special. They have no notion of the size of
the Web page on which the viewport will ultimately be positioned. They do have a notion
of viewport size, though this will typically be overridden when the output file is placed on
a page by a Web page designer. When producing SVG or WebCGM output, the viewport
size is set in the usual way: by PAGESIZE, or (in the case of the graphics programs) the
‘--page-size’ option. For example, if the specified page size is "letter", the viewport
within which SVG or WebCGM graphics are drawn will be an 8 in by 8 in square. If it is
"letter,xsize=6in,ysize=7in", then the viewport will be a 6 in by 7 in rectangle, and so forth.
The "xorigin", "yorigin", "xoffset", and "yoffset" specifiers, if included, are necessarily
ignored.
For a similar reason, the "xorigin" and "yorigin" specifiers are ignored when producing
HP-GL or HP-GL/2 output. By default, the lower left corner of the viewport is positioned
at the HP-GL ‘scaling point’ P1, whose location is device-dependent and will not normally
coincide with the lower left corner of the physical page, though it may be close to it. The
"xoffset" and "yoffset" specifiers are respected, however, and may be used to shift the
viewport away from its default position.
Appendix D: The Graphics Metafile Format 169

Appendix D The Graphics Metafile Format

A GNU graphics metafile is produced by any application that uses the Metafile Plotter sup-
port contained in GNU libplot. That includes the raw variants of graph, plot, pic2plot,
tek2plot, and plotfont. A metafile is a sort of audit trail, which specifies a sequence of
Plotter operations. Each operation is represented by an ‘op code’: a single ASCII character.
The arguments of the operation, if any, immediately follow the op code.
A metafile may use either of two encodings: binary (the default) or portable (human-
readable). Metafiles in the binary encoding begin with the magic string "#PLOT 1\n",
and metafiles in the portable encoding with the magic string "#PLOT 2\n". If you intend
to transfer metafiles between machines of different types, you should use the portable rather
than the binary encoding. Portable metafiles are produced by Metafile Plotters if the META_
PORTABLE parameter is set to "yes", and by the raw variants of GNU graph and the other
command-line graphics programs if the ‘-O’ option is specified. Both binary and portable
metafiles can be translated to other formats by GNU plot. See Chapter 3 [plot], page 30.
In the portable encoding, the arguments of each operation (integers, floating point num-
bers, or strings) are printed in a human-readable form, separated by spaces, and each
argument list ends with a newline. In the binary encoding, the arguments are represented
as integers, single precision floating point numbers, or newline-terminated ASCII strings.
Using the newline character as a terminator is acceptable because each Plotter operation
includes a maximum of one string among its arguments, and such a string may not include
a newline. Also, the string must come last among the arguments.
There are 97 Plotter operations in all. The most important are openpl and closepl,
which open and close a Plotter, i.e., begin and end a page of graphics. They are represented
by the op codes ‘o’ and ‘x’, respectively. The erase operation, if present, separates frames
within a page. On real-time display devices, it is interpreted as a screen erasure. It is
represented by the op code ‘e’.
Each of the 94 other Plotter operations has a corresponding op code, with 12 ex-
ceptions. These 12 exceptions are (1) the control operation flushpl, (2) the operations
havecap, labelwidth, and flabelwidth, which merely return information, (3) the color,
colorname, pencolorname, fillcolorname, and bgcolorname operations, which are in-
ternally mapped to pencolor, fillcolor, and bgcolor, (4) the frotate, fscale, and
ftranslate operations, which are internally mapped to fconcat, and (5) the ffontname
operation, which in a metafile would be indistinguishable from fontname. So besides
‘o’ and ‘x’, there are 83 possible op codes, for a total of 85. The following table lists 10
of the op codes other than ‘o’ and ‘x’, followed by the Plotter operation they stand for.
Op Code Operation
‘a’ arc
‘c’ circle
‘e’ erase
‘f’ linemod
‘l’ line
‘m’ move
Appendix D: The Graphics Metafile Format 170

‘n’ cont
‘p’ point
‘s’ space
‘t’ label
The full set of 85 op codes is listed in the libplot header file ‘plot.h’ and the libplotter
header file ‘plotter.h’, which are distributed along with the plotting utilities. On most
systems they are installed in ‘/usr/include’ or ‘/usr/local/include’.
The 10 op codes in the table above are actually the op codes of the traditional ‘plot(5)’
format produced by pre-GNU versions of graph and libplot. The use of these op codes
make GNU metafile format compatible with plot(5) format. The absence of a magic string,
and the absence of the ‘o’ and ‘x’ op codes, makes it possible to distinguish files in plot(5)
format from GNU metafiles in the binary encoding. GNU plot can convert files in plot(5)
format to GNU metafiles in either the binary or the portable encoding. See Chapter 3
[plot], page 30.
Appendix E: Obtaining Auxiliary Software 171

Appendix E Obtaining Auxiliary Software

E.1 How to get idraw

The idraw utility mentioned several times in this documentation is a freely distributable
interactive drawing editor for the X Window System. It can display and edit the output of
any application that uses the Postscript Plotter support contained in GNU libplot. That
includes graph -T ps, plot -T ps, pic2plot -T ps, tek2plot -T ps, and plotfont -T ps.
The current version of idraw is maintained by Vectaport, Inc., and is available at their
Web site. It is part of the ivtools package, which is a framework for building custom draw-
ing editors. idraw was originally part of the InterViews package, developed by Stanford
University and Silicon Graphics. The InterViews package is available at a distribution site,
but is no longer supported. Retrieving the ivtools package instead is recommended.
Also available at Vectaport’s Web site is an enhanced version of idraw called drawtool.
drawtool can import additional graphics in TIFF and PBM/PGM/PPM formats, besides
the X11 bitmaps that idraw can import.

E.2 How to get xfig

The xfig utility mentioned several times in this documentation is a freely distributable
interactive drawing editor for the X Window System. It can display and edit the output of
any application that uses the Fig Plotter support contained in GNU libplot. That includes
graph -T fig, plot -T fig, pic2plot -T fig, tek2plot -T fig, and plotfont -T fig.
The current version is available at ftp: / / ftp . x . org / contrib / applications /
drawing_tools/. It can import additional graphics in GIF, X11 bitmap, and Postscript
formats. Accompanying the editor is a package called transfig, which allows xfig
graphics to be exported in many formats. GIF, X11 bitmap, LaTEX, and Postscript
formats are supported.
There is a Web page on Fig format, which discusses application software that can inter-
operate with xfig.
Appendix F: History and Acknowledgements 172

Appendix F History and Acknowledgements

Several of the GNU plotting utilities were inspired by Unix plotting utilities. A graph utility
and various plot filters were present in the first releases of Unix from Bell Laboratories, going
at least as far back as the Version 4 distribution (1973). The first supported display device
was a Tektronix 611 storage scope. Most of the work on tying the plot filters together
and breaking out device-dependent versions of libplot was performed by Lorinda Cherry.
By the time of Version 7 Unix (1979) and the subsequent Berkeley releases, the package
consisting of graph, plot, spline, and several device-dependent versions of libplot was
a standard Unix feature. Supported devices by the early 1980’s included Tektronix storage
scopes, early graphics terminals, 200 dpi electrostatic printer/plotters from Versatec and
Varian, and pen plotters from Hewlett–Packard.
In 1989, Rich Murphey wrote the first GNU versions of graph, plot, and spline,
and the earliest documentation. Richard Stallman further directed development of the
programs and provided editorial support for the documentation. John Interrante, then of
the InterViews team at Stanford, generously provided the idraw Postscript prologue now
included in libplot, and helpful comments. The package as it stood in 1991 was distributed
under the name ‘GNU graphics’.
In 1995 Robert S. Maier took over development of the package, and designed and wrote
the current, maximally device-independent, standalone version of libplot. He also rewrote
graph from scratch, turning it into a real-time filter that would use the new library. He
fleshed out spline too, by adding support for splines in tension, periodicity, and cubic
Bessel interpolation.
libplot now incorporates the X Window System code for filling polygons and drawing
wide polygonal lines and arcs. The code is used when producing output in bitmap formats
(e.g., PNG, PNM, and pseudo-GIF). It was written by Brian Kelleher, Joel McCormack,
Todd Newman, Keith Packard, Robert Scheifler and Ken Whaley, who worked for Digital
Equipment Corp., MIT, and/or the X Consortium, and is copyright c 1985–89 by the
X Consortium. Affinely transformed text strings are now generated and displayed by a
technique similar to that used by Alan Richardson in his xvertext package, for displaying
rotated strings.
The pseudo-GIF support now in libplot uses the ‘miGIF’ run-length encoding routines
developed by der Maus and ivo which are copyright c 1998 by Hutchison Avenue Soft-
ware Corporation. The copyright notice and permission notice for the miGIF routines are
distributed with the source code distribution of the plotting utilities.
Most development work on ode was performed by Nick Tufillaro in 1978–1994, on a
sequence of platforms that extended back to a PDP-11 running Version 4 Unix. In 1997
Robert Maier modified his 1994 version to agree with GNU conventions on coding and
command-line parsing, extended it to support the full set of special functions supported by
gnuplot, and extended the exception handling.
Many other people aided the development of the plotting utilities package along the
way. The Hershey vector fonts now in libplot are of course based on the characters
digitized in the mid to late 1960’s by Allen V. Hershey, who deserves a vote of thanks.
Additional characters and/or marker symbols were taken from the SLAC Unified Graphics
System developed by Robert C. Beach in the mid-1970’s, and from the fonts designed by
Appendix F: History and Acknowledgements 173

Thomas Wolff for Ghostscript. The interpolation algorithms used in spline are based
on the algorithms of Alan K. Cline, as described in his papers in the Apr. 1974 issue of
Communications of the ACM . The table-driven parser used in tek2plot was written at
Berkeley in the mid-1980’s by Edward Moy. The ‘sagitta’ algorithm used in an extended
form in libplot for drawing circular and elliptic arcs was developed by Peter Karow of
URW and Ken Turkowski of Apple. Raymond Toy helped with the tick mark spacing
code in graph and was the first to incorporate GNU getopt. Arthur Smith, formerly of
LASSP at Cornell, provided code for his xplot utility. Nelson Beebe exhaustively tested
the package installation process.
Robert Maier wrote the documentation, which now incorporates Nick Tufillaro’s ode
manual. Julie Sussmann checked over the documentation for style and clarity.
Appendix G: Reporting Bugs 174

Appendix G Reporting Bugs

Please report all bugs in the GNU plotting utilities, including the libplot library, to
[email protected]. Be sure to say which version of the plotting utilities package you
have. Each command-line program announces the package version if you use the ‘--version’
argument.
If you installed the package from scratch, be sure to say what compiler (and compiler
version) you used. If your problems are installation-related, be sure to give all relevant
information.
Appendix H: GNU Free Documentation License 175

Appendix H GNU Free Documentation License

Version 1.2, November 2002
Copyright 2000, 2001, 2002 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
c
51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA 02110-1301, USA

Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim copies

of this license document, but changing it is not allowed.
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This License is a kind of “copyleft”, which means that derivative works of the document
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We have designed this License in order to use it for manuals for free software, because
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Appendix H: GNU Free Documentation License 178

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Appendix H: GNU Free Documentation License 179

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You may extract a single document from such a collection, and distribute it individu-
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documents or works, in or on a volume of a storage or distribution medium, is called
Appendix H: GNU Free Documentation License 180

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Appendix H: GNU Free Documentation License 181

H.1 ADDENDUM: How to use this License for your

documents
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If your document contains nontrivial examples of program code, we recommend releasing
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General Public License, to permit their use in free software.
 i

Table of Contents

1 The GNU Plotting Utilities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

2 The graph Application . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

2.1 Simple examples using graph . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
2.2 Non-square, displaced, and rotated plots . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
2.3 Preparing a plot from more than one dataset . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
2.4 Multiplotting: placing multiple plots on a single page . . . . . . . . . . 12
2.5 Reading binary and other data formats . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
2.6 graph command-line options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
2.6.1 Plot options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
2.6.2 Dataset options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
2.6.3 Multiplot options. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
2.6.4 Raw graph options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
2.6.5 Informational options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
2.7 Environment variables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

3 The plot Program . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30

3.1 How to use plot . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
3.2 plot command-line options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
3.3 Environment variables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36

4 The pic2plot Program . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39

4.1 What pic2plot is used for . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
4.2 pic2plot command-line options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
4.3 Environment variables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45

5 The tek2plot Program . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48

5.1 What tek2plot is used for . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
5.2 tek2plot command-line options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
5.3 Environment variables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53

6 The plotfont Utility . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56

6.1 How to use plotfont . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
6.2 plotfont command-line options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
6.3 Environment variables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61

7 The spline Program. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64

7.1 How to use spline . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
7.2 Advanced use of spline . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
7.3 spline command-line options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
 ii

8 The ode Program . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71

8.1 Mathematical basics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
8.2 Simple examples using ode . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72
8.3 Additional examples using ode . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
8.4 ode command-line options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
8.5 Diagnostic messages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80
8.6 Numerical error and how to avoid it . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
8.7 Running time . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
8.8 The ode input language formally specified . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
8.9 Bibliography on ode and solving differential equations . . . . . . . . . 89

9 libplot, a 2-D Vector Graphics Library . . . . . 90

9.1 Programming with libplot: An overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
9.2 C Programming with libplot . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
9.2.1 The C application programming interface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
9.2.2 Older C application programming interfaces . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
9.2.3 C compiling and linking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96
9.2.4 Sample drawings in C . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
9.2.5 Simple paths and compound paths . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102
9.2.6 Drawing on a physical page . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104
9.2.7 Animated GIFs in C . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106
9.2.8 X Window System animations in C . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
9.2.9 Advanced X Window System programming . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112
9.3 C++ Programming with libplotter . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
9.3.1 The Plotter class . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
9.3.2 C++ compiling and linking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
9.3.3 Sample drawings in C++. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
9.4 The functions in libplot: A detailed listing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
9.4.1 Control functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
9.4.2 Object-drawing functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
9.4.3 Attribute-setting functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127
9.4.4 Mapping functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135
9.5 Plotter parameters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136

Appendix A Fonts, Strings, and Symbols . . . . 144

A.1 Available text fonts. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 144
A.2 Cyrillic and Japanese fonts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149
A.3 Available text fonts for the X Window System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150
A.4 Text string format and escape sequences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151
A.5 Available marker symbols. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 163

Appendix B Specifying Colors by Name . . . . . 166

Appendix C Page Sizes and Viewport Sizes

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167
 iii

Appendix D The Graphics Metafile Format

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169

Appendix E Obtaining Auxiliary Software . . 171

E.1 How to get idraw . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 171
E.2 How to get xfig . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 171

Appendix F History and Acknowledgements

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172

Appendix G Reporting Bugs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 174

Appendix H GNU Free Documentation License

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 175
H.1 ADDENDUM: How to use this License for your documents. . . 181