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The Plot Panel

This panel displays and controls aspects of plots generated from a simulation with the plot command. The plot window contains a row of buttons on the right side. The button presence is determined by the nature of the data plotted, as not all data support all features. The buttons that may be present are listed below.

Dismiss
Remove the plot from the screen.

Help
Bring up the help viewer with pertinent information.

Redraw
Redraw the graph. This would be necessary to see new colors if the colors are changed, with the Colors pop-up from the Tools menu of the Tool Control window.

Print
Bring up the printer control panel which controls hardcopy generation. The resulting hardcopy data from the plot can be sent to a printer or saved in a file.

Save
Save the plot to a file containing the plot data. The user is prompted for a name for the file. If the name is given an extension that starts with ``raw'', the plot data will be saved in rawfile format. Otherwise, the format will be as generated by the print command.

Points
If this button is active, the data points are marked with a glyph. This is mutually exclusive with the Comb button.

Comb
If this button, which is mutually exclusive with the Points button, is active, the data will be presented as a histogram. If neither of Points or Comb is selected, a (possibly interpolated) line drawing connecting the points will be presented.

Log X
If the data are consistent with a logarithmic scale of the x-axis, this button will appear. When active, a log scale will be used on the x-axis.

Log Y
If the data are consistent with a logarithmic scale of the y-axis, this button will appear. When active, a log scale will be used on the y-axis. Note that all traces must be consistent with a log scale, and all traces will use a log scale if this button is active.

Marker
When active, a marker will be attached to the cursor, and the scale factors of the plot will be replaced with the current position of the marker relative to the data. This is useful for actually obtaining numerical data from the plot. If button 1 is clicked, a reference mark will be left behind, and the readout will be relative to the values at the reference. Clicking with button 2 will remove the reference.

When using the marker in a polar or Smith plot, the display indicates the real, imaginary, radius, and angle in degrees of the current marker position. The radius and angle are shown in the lower left corner of the plot window. In Smith plots, a family of real and imaginary values are shown, corresponding to a set of values usually displayed along the x axis. For the imaginary contours, the values correspond to the values printed in left to right order. If mouse button three is used to zoom into a section of the Smith plot such that the x axis is invisible, the values corresponding to the displayed real contours are listed along the top of the plot window. These numbers correspond to the displayed real contours in left to right order. They also correspond to the imaginary contours, however depending on the location in the Smith chart, not all imaginary contours, or additional contours, may be visible. Ambiguity can be resolved through use of the marker.

Separate
When active, each trace will be assigned a portion of the overall vertical plot area, and a separate scale. The traces will be scaled so as to not overlap. Otherwise, the entire vertical area is used for each trace. The button will appear if there is more than one trace in the plot.

Single, Group
In the most general case, two buttons in a ``radio group'' control the y-axis scales of the traces. These buttons are labeled Single and Group. If neither button is active, each trace will have an independent ``best fit'' y scale. If Single is active, all traces will be plotted on the same ``best fit'' y scale. If Group is active, the traces are scaled according to their data type. The types are voltage, current, and other. Each group will have a separate ``best fit'' scale. If the trace is from a node voltage, then it will have type voltage, however functions of voltages will probably have type other. This is similarly true for currents.

The Single and Group buttons are prevented from being active at the same time. If there is only one trace, or the traces are all of the same type, the Group button will not appear. If there is only one trace, then the Single button will also not appear.

If button 3 is pressed and held while pointing at the graph, an outline box is shown, which follows the cursor, anchored at the location pointed to. Releasing button 3 will create a new plot of the area in the box. Pressing Ctrl-button 1 is equivalent to button 3 for this operation.

Text that appears in plots will use a font that can be changed most easily from the font selection panel obtained from the Fonts button in the Tools menu of the Tool Control window. This font can also be changed with the setfont command.

Any text typed while the pointer is in the plot window will appear on the plot (and hardcopies). This is useful for annotation. A mechanism exists for editing this text, and other text, such as the plot title, which appears in the plot window. When the user presses a character key, the character appears in the plot window at the current location of the pointer. Additional characters will be added after the first, even if the pointer moves (but remains in the plot window) until Enter is pressed. This terminates the current entry, allowing the user to enter a new string at a different location.

The Bsp (backspace) key will remove the last character typed, while entering a string. Previously entered strings, and other text which appears on the plot can be edited by deleting characters with Bsp and retyping. First, the desired string must be selected, by clicking with button 1. Alternatively, the left and right arrow keys can perform this function. Pressing one of these keys will move the pointer to the end of the new current string. Each string in the plot can be selected by repeatedly pressing one of these keys. The right arrow key cycles through the internal list in a forward sense, the left arrow cycles through the list backwards (the ``oldest'' string becomes the current string). Once a string is selected, pressing Bsp once ``unterminates'' the string, so that characters typed will be added to that string. Additional presses of the Bsp key will delete characters. If all characters have been deleted, pressing Bsp once more will delete the string anchor position, as indicated by the pointer moving to another string. If the termination is deleted, the string can be reterminated by pressing the Enter key.

The up and down arrow keys cycle the color of the current string through an internal list of 19 colors. These are the same colors used for plot traces. To change the color of the title, for example, one would click on the title string, then press the up or down arrow keys until the title color is satisfactory.

In plots, most text and the traces can be moved by dragging with mouse button 1, either within a plot or between plot windows. Thus, the order of the traces can be changed. Traces can be ``grabbed'' by pressing button 1 near the trace legend, but not over the legend text itself. A square wave marker is attached to the pointer when a trace is being dragged. Traces are actually copied, not moved, between plots. If the scale is not compatible between the two plot windows, the copy will fail. This is an easy way to see differences between simulation runs.

If a single multidimensional variable is plotted, the dimensions are shown using different colors, with a legend printed at the left. Clicking on one of the colored numbers will toggle visibility of that trace. If there are too many traces to list, a label ``more'' will exist at the bottom of the listing. Clicking on this label will cycle through all of the trace labels.

The plot windows contain icons for changing the scales. These are triangles; the x-axis icons are in the lower left corner, and the y-axis icons are arrayed along the right edge. Clicking on one of these icons has the following effects:

right or up
button 1 move the scale interval to the right or up
button 2 or Shift-button 1 extend the right or top scale factor to the right or up
button 3 or Ctrl-button 1 contract the right or top scale factor to the left or down
left or down
button 1 move the scale interval to the left or down
button 2 or Shift-button 1 extend the left or bottom scale factor to the left or down
button 3 or Ctrl-button 1 contract the left or bottom scale factor to the right or up


next up previous contents index
Next: The Mplot Panel Up: The WRspice User Interface Previous: The Text Editor   Contents   Index
Stephen R. Whiteley 2006-10-23