RJones@exua.exeter.ac.uk (Bob Jones) (10/13/90)
I would be very grateful for any comments regarding scientific graphing packages. I am interested in interactive packages and FORTRAN/C libraries. At present we are mainly using UNIRAS graphics on a SUN workstation and Cricket Graph 1.2 on the Macintosh. Although the Mac interface makes Cricket Graph very easy to use it does not do everything that one would like. It does not allow 3D plots for example. On the other hand, although UNIRAS is a much more comprehensive package it is a pig to learn and clumsy to use. The UNIRAS interactives: Unigraph2000( for 2D/3D graph plotting ) and Uniedit2000( for drawing ) do not use a Mac like interface where one clicks on an object and in so doing pops up a relevant menu. Instead one has to traverse a multitude of menus before finally selecting which graphic object the menu option should be applied to -basically a very counter-intuitive exercise! There are also many elementary things that UNIRAS is unable to do. Error bars are not possible for example! Thanks in advance, Rob.
redmond@maeps31.ncsu.edu (James Redmond) (10/15/90)
I suggest you get some information on GRAFTOOL from 3-D Visions. We purchased it for our PC's but I'm unaware of its availability for Mac. #-D Visions Corporation 412 S. Pacific Coast Highway Second Floor Redondo Beach, CA 90277 (213) 540-8818.
thomson@cs.utah.edu (Rich Thomson) (10/15/90)
In article <RJONES.90Oct13164011@exua.exua.exeter.ac.uk> RJones@exua.exeter.ac.uk (Bob Jones) writes: >I would be very grateful for any comments regarding scientific >graphing packages. I am interested in interactive packages and >FORTRAN/C libraries. I have been playing alot with AVS lately (Stardent's Application Visualization System) and it is pretty comprehensive in letting you manipulate things. It is mostly geared towards 3D rendering, but I have heard that there is a group of 3D modules available for AVS. AVS lets you customize things by writing your own modules (implemented as a UN*X process), which can be either in C or FORTRAN. I've played around with writing my own modules and it's pretty easy to integrate into AVS. It's not written specifically for graphing, but it could handle that as a subset. I haven't seen the "graphing" modules that are supposedly produced commercially. -- Rich Rich Thomson thomson@cs.utah.edu {bellcore,hplabs,uunet}!utah-cs!thomson ``If everybody is thinking the same thing, is anybody thinking?'' --Bob Johnson
v055l9y3@ubvmsd.cc.buffalo.edu (Stephen A Zelazny) (11/04/90)
In article <RJONES.90Oct13164011@exua.exua.exeter.ac.uk>, RJones@exua.exeter.ac.uk (Bob Jones) writes... >I would be very grateful for any comments regarding scientific >graphing packages. I am interested in interactive packages and >FORTRAN/C libraries. At present we are mainly using UNIRAS graphics on >a SUN workstation and Cricket Graph 1.2 on the Macintosh. Although >the Mac interface makes Cricket Graph very easy to use it does not do >everything that one would like. It does not allow 3D plots for >example. On the other hand, although UNIRAS is a much more >comprehensive package it is a pig to learn and clumsy to use. The >UNIRAS interactives: Unigraph2000( for 2D/3D graph plotting ) and >Uniedit2000( for drawing ) do not use a Mac like interface where one >clicks on an object and in so doing pops up a relevant menu. Instead >one has to traverse a multitude of menus before finally selecting >which graphic object the menu option should be applied to -basically a >very counter-intuitive exercise! There are also many elementary things >that UNIRAS is unable to do. Error bars are not possible for example!> As far as macintosh graphing packages are concerned, the program DeltaGraph by Deltapoint, inc. seems to have the 3D plots which you say you miss as well as many other features which seemed to be lacking from Cricket Graph when I explored that package. To me, Deltagraph seems to be an infinitely better package. My computer of choice, however, is the IBM and for this machine I use a package called Tech-Graph-Pad which produces most of my graph needs (It does lack 3d plots however). Hope this helps somewhat. STeve Zelazny v055l9y3@ubvmsd.cc.buffalo.edu
ravi@earth.ce.nwu.edu (Ravi Sinha) (11/05/90)
In article <44236@eerie.acsu.Buffalo.EDU> v055l9y3@ubvmsd.cc.buffalo.edu writes: >In article <RJONES.90Oct13164011@exua.exua.exeter.ac.uk>, RJones@exua.exeter.ac.uk (Bob Jones) writes... >>I would be very grateful for any comments regarding scientific >>graphing packages. I am interested in interactive packages and >>FORTRAN/C libraries. At present we are mainly using UNIRAS graphics on >>a SUN workstation and Cricket Graph 1.2 on the Macintosh. Although >>the Mac interface makes Cricket Graph very easy to use it does not do >>everything that one would like. > >As far as macintosh graphing packages are concerned, the program DeltaGraph by >Deltapoint, inc. seems to have the 3D plots which you say you miss as well as >many other features which seemed to be lacking from Cricket Graph when I >explored that package. To me, Deltagraph seems to be an infinitely better >package. > I have been using DeltaGraph since the last week or so. Some comments: (1) It is much more powerful than CricketGraph. Does all sort of neat things like 3-D Graphs, user controlled orientation of graph, ability to decide vanishing points etc. (2) The print output is in postscript. Looks really sharp. Nothing like the jagged curves you sometimes get with CG. (3) There are other things which are very difficult to do on DG. One is combining lines whose data is in different files. Just can't be done. You have to put them all in one file, and in one worksheet in order to use paired x-y plots. A *REAL* pain. (4) If you define axis range less than the total data range, DG magnonimously plots the whole line, even the points outside the range of axes. Not really useful. I haven't yet figured out a way around it. I am not even sure if there is one. Considering everything, it is a better product than CricketGraph. However, for some things you still have to use CG rather than DG. --------------------------------------------------------------------- Ravi Sinha | As usual, the opinions here Northwestern University | are mine, and only mine. ravi@earth.ce.nwu.edu | Who'd want to claim these anyway?