Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!uwm.edu!bionet!hayes.ims.alaska.edu!accuvax.nwu.edu!earth!ravi From: ravi@earth.ce.nwu.edu (Ravi Sinha) Newsgroups: comp.graphics Subject: Re: Scientific graphics packages? Message-ID: <14323@accuvax.nwu.edu> Date: 4 Nov 90 18:49:15 GMT References: <44236@eerie.acsu.Buffalo.EDU> Sender: news@accuvax.nwu.edu Reply-To: ravi@earth (Ravi Sinha) Organization: Civil Engineering Dept., Northwestern University Lines: 41 In article <44236@eerie.acsu.Buffalo.EDU> v055l9y3@ubvmsd.cc.buffalo.edu writes: >In article , 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?