From maintainers-request at octave dot org Fri Feb 24 13:21:47 2006
Subject: Re: octave gset, graw
From: Daniel J Sebald <daniel dot sebald at ieee dot org>
To: Quentin Spencer <qspencer at ieee dot org>
CC: Bill Denney <denney at seas dot upenn dot edu>,         Volker Kuhlmann <list0570@paradise.net.nz>, maintainers@octave.org
Date: Fri, 24 Feb 2006 13:29:04 -0600

Quentin Spencer wrote:
> Daniel J Sebald wrote:
>> I understand some people want handle graphics, but I won't necessarily 
>> want to use that.  I've said before to the list that I find simply 
>> typing a command like "graw('set size square\n')".  Perhaps I'd 
>> migrate back to handle graphics but I always thought it cumbersome in 
>> the fact that one has to figure out first through 
>> parent/child/grandchild what it is they want to change.  HG commands 
>> were always something I'd save for the very end.
> 
> 
> Cumbersome, maybe, but I always found it more intuitive when I want to 
> change a low-level setting than trying to search through gnuplot's 
> documentation. The other motivation for HG of course is "compatibility 
> with the other brand".

I won't argue against either of those points... although I think that in the gnuplot doc if one sees, for example

octave:5> graw('help set term gif\n')
octave:6>
 Syntax:
       set terminal gif
                        {tiny | small | medium | large | giant}
                        {{no}transparent} {{no}enhanced}
                        {font <face> {<pointsize>}}
                        {animate {delay <time>} {{no}optimize}}
                        {size <x>,<y>} {{no}crop}
                        {<color0> <color1> <color2> ...}

it isn't too difficult to figure out the capabilities at least.  Granted there is some reading involved, but hopefully when you've used the feature once, seeing this syntax summary jogs one's memory.


> I was under the impression that __gnuplot_raw__ isn't going away, but 
> that the change was done to discourage it's use in favor of the 
> high-level matlab functions, and eventually the HG implementation. I 
> think it was partly in response to the number of newbies on the mailing 
> lists trying to do things with the gset commands that could be done with 
> simpler commands using higher level matlab-compatible functions that 
> were already available.

That is pretty much how I understood things too.

Dan