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<title>ploticus: welcome</title>
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<td><br><h2>Welcome</h2></td>
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<a href="../doc/welcome.html"><img src="../doc/ploticus.gif" border=0></a><br>
Version 2.41 Mar2009
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<title>Manual page for Welcome(PL)</title>
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<a href="prefabs.html">• Prefabs handbook</a>
<a href="scripthome.html">• Scripts handbook</a>
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<img src="../gallery/prefab_img/pie4thm.gif" alt="pie graphs">
<img src="../gallery/thumbnails/curvefit3.gif" alt="curve fitting">
<img src="../gallery/prefab_img/vbars2thm.gif" alt="distributions">
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<a href="news.html">• What's New</a>
<a href="http://ploticus.sourceforge.net/doc/download.html">• Download</a>
<a href="http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ploticus">• Newsgroup</a>
<a href="../gallery/index.html">• Examples gallery</a>
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<FORM ACTION="http://search.freefind.com/find.html" METHOD="GET">
Search the ploticus web site:
<INPUT TYPE="HIDDEN" NAME="id" VALUE="80868605">
<INPUT TYPE="HIDDEN" NAME="pid" VALUE="r">
<INPUT TYPE="HIDDEN" NAME="mode" VALUE="ALL">
<INPUT type="HIDDEN" name="n" value="0">
<INPUT TYPE="TEXT" NAME="query" SIZE="20">
<INPUT TYPE="SUBMIT" VALUE=" Go ">
<br><small>(Powered by <A HREF="http://www.freefind.com">FreeFind</A>)</small>
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<td><b>What is ploticus?</td>
<td>A free, GPL, non-interactive software package for producing plots, charts, and graphics from data.
It was developed in a Unix/C environment and runs on
<a href="download.html">various Unix, Linux, and win32 systems</a>.
<b>ploticus</b> is good for automated or just-in-time graph generation, handles date and time
data nicely, and has basic statistical capabilities. It allows significant user control
over colors, styles, options and details. Ploticus is a mature package, available since 1999, and
version 2.40 has more than 12,000 downloads to date.
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<td><b>Where can I get ploticus?</td>
<td><a href="http://ploticus.sourceforge.net/doc/download.html">http://ploticus.sourceforge.net</a>.
The site has downloads (source code and pre-compiled binaries), full documentation, and a
large gallery of examples.
The primary author of ploticus is
<a href="http://ploticus.sourceforge.net/steve.html">Steve Grubb</a>.
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<td><b>How do I run ploticus?</td>
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From the command line you can run ploticus using the <a href="pl.1.html">pl</a> command.
The <tt>pl</tt> command can also be invoked via <a href="cgi.html">CGI</a>.
C developers can use <a href="api.html">libploticus</a>. Other interfaces
exist for packages such as Python.
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<td><b>What's the easiest way to get started?</td>
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Use <b>prefabs</b>. This is an easy-to-use interface for quickly generating basic data displays and plots.
You specify parameters on the command line, like this:
<tt> pl -prefab vdist data=data6 y=1 </tt> ..
everything else is done automatically.
Read all about it in the
<a href="prefabs.html">ploticus prefabs handbook</a>, or look at the
<a href="prefab_gallery.html">gallery of prefab examples</a>.
Prefabs are designed to handle common basic requirements but flexibility is limited... for more involved
projects use ploticus scripts (see below).
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<td><b>How can I unlock the full power of ploticus?</td>
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By coding <b>ploticus scripts</b>.
This gives you access to the full range of capabilities and options, and allows
you to produce multiple graphs, overlays, manipulate data, and so on.
Complete documentation for writing scripts is in the <a href="scripthome.html">ploticus scripts handbook</a>,
and a <a href="../gallery/index.html">gallery of script examples</a> is available.
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<td><b>What graphic formats can ploticus produce?</td>
<td>
PNG, JPEG, and pseudo-GIF images.
PostScript, EPS, <a href="svg.html">SVG</a> and
<a href="swf.html">SWF</a> (shockwave-flash) vector formats.
X11 for development and interactive applications.
Also, server-side or client-side <a href="clickmap.html">imagemaps</a> can be generated for
providing click-thru or
<a href="clickmap.html">mouseover popup text bubbles (tooltips)</a> in web-based applications.
Availability of some formats is dependent on configuration.
The graphic format may be specified on the command line, eg. <tt>pl -png</tt>
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<td><b>What about input data?</td>
<td>
<a href="dataformat.html">Input data</a> can come from files, commands, or standard input, and should be
ascii text with data organized into fields.
Fields may be delimited by white-space, tab, or comma.
Data types that can be plotted include
<a href="scaleunits.html">numeric, category, date, and time</a>.
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<td><b>Other useful information</td>
<td>
<li><a href="faq.html">FAQ</a>
<li>Notes on using ploticus for..<br>
<a href="web.html">generating web-based graphics</a><br>
<a href="dynamic.html">dynamic content and just-in-time applications</a><br>
<a href="paper.html">paper-based reports</a><br>
<a href="posters.html">large-sized posters</a><br>
<a href="prepress.html">pre-press work</a><br>
<li><a href="api.html">libploticus(3)</a> C language API
<li><a href="limits.html">Program limitations</a>
<li><a href="buildinfo.html">Download and build instructions</a>
<li><a href="support.html">Troubleshooting & support</a>
<li><a href="Copyright.html">Copyright and permissions <img src="../doc/gpl.gif" border=0></a>
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<td align=right>
<a href="../doc/welcome.html">
<img src="../doc/ploticus.gif" border=0></a><br><small>data display engine <br>
<a href="../doc/Copyright.html">Copyright Steve Grubb</a>
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<img src="../gallery/all.gif">
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Ploticus is hosted at http://ploticus.sourceforge.net</td><td> </td><td>
<a href="http://sourceforge.net/projects/ploticus"><img src="http://sflogo.sourceforge.net/sflogo.php?group_id=38453&type=12"
width="120" height="30" border="0"
alt="Get ploticus data display engine at SourceForge.net. Fast, secure and Free Open Source software downloads" /></a>
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