# Port/Pkg For Generating Line Graphs



## Geezer (Jun 10, 2021)

Does anyone have any recommendation for a port/pkg to generate multi-line graphs as png files from data stored in text files?

I can sort of do it with mrtg, but it is a bit limited.

Thank you.


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## covacat (Jun 10, 2021)

gnuplot ?


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## Geezer (Jun 10, 2021)

covacat said:


> gnuplot ?



Yes. Just made a few quick messy graphs. Tomorrow I am going to read the documentation.


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## zirias@ (Jun 10, 2021)

I used gnuplot ages ago for my "Studienarbeit" (roughly comparable to a bachelor thesis, _before_ Germany joined "Bologna"), to visualize data points from simulations. It's the de-facto standard tool for these things


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## Jose (Jun 10, 2021)

math/R


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## Alain De Vos (Jun 10, 2021)

I have used plain latex with tikz,








						TikZ package - Overleaf, Online LaTeX Editor
					

An online LaTeX editor that’s easy to use. No installation, real-time collaboration, version control, hundreds of LaTeX templates, and more.




					www.overleaf.com


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## Crivens (Jun 10, 2021)

Graphviz?


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## ralphbsz (Jun 10, 2021)

If by graphs you mean the thing that is typically used in the sciences, and that shows how one variable depends on another variable (for example temperature as a function of time-of-day), then gnuplot is the default free tool. It is somewhat inflexible, slow to use (you have to prepare input files in gnuplot format), hard to interface with existing data sources (you have to extract the data and convert it to gnuplot files), and the graphs end up looking pretty boring.

More modern tools exist. Jose pointed out the R language, which has a graphing tool built in. I happen to like Jupyter notebooks, which allow one to program in Python (with all the ease of accessing data sources from there), then use pandas / pyplot / matplotlib / numpy.

On the other hand, if by graphs you mean generic drawings (for example showing data structures like trees, or showing circuit diagrams with resistors and transistors), then the generic solution is dot. It is a generic language for putting graphical elements (markers, dots, lines, rectangles, circles ...) in particular places. Usually, dot files are written by other programs or scripts, which convert the raw data.


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## Alain De Vos (Jun 10, 2021)

Some people use python, but I've forgotten the package-name.


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## zirias@ (Jun 10, 2021)

ralphbsz said:


> It is somewhat inflexible, slow to use (you have to prepare input files in gnuplot format)


Of course, there's a practical extraction and report language


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## covacat (Jun 10, 2021)

real men just cat > program.ps


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## Crivens (Jun 10, 2021)

covacat said:


> real men just cat > program.ps


Obligatory xkcd


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## Jose (Jun 10, 2021)

__





						The Story of Mel
					





					www.cs.utah.edu


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## covacat (Jun 10, 2021)

Crivens said:


> Obligatory xkcd


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## Jose (Jun 10, 2021)

ralphbsz said:


> More modern tools exist. Jose pointed out the R language, which has a graphing tool built in. I happen to like Jupyter notebooks, which allow one to program in Python (with all the ease of accessing data sources from there), then use pandas / pyplot / matplotlib / numpy.






_View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7jiPeIFXb6U_


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## Geezer (Jun 11, 2021)

As advised, I am using gnuplot. It works, it does what I want and I got it there quickly.

The remainder of this thread, though amusing, seems to have rapidly gone into red shift.

[REDSHIFT] ...


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