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Graphics can be a force for good, and can be done in Perl

by Anonymous Monk
on May 21, 2003 at 20:43 UTC ( [id://259879]=note: print w/replies, xml ) Need Help??


in reply to Re: Plotting XP
in thread Plotting XP

My feelings regarding form over content and the Tragedy of HTML are in agreement with Abigail's long-standing manifesto cited above. The CERN/TB-L view of the WWW was ruined by the introduction of Marketing-style graphic design. However, when the data is rich enough, graphics and even color graphics are appropriate. See Bertin and/or Tufte. 1 2 3 4
(Note that conformant to dogma, these are em tags not i tags!) Abigail's manifesto is upheld perfectly, since not only was the data rich enough to grpah, the article showed the code but didn't link the graphic.

system()ing out to gnuplot is fine for those who have it and are comfortable with it. I recall doing stereograms with Unix V7 plot and a daiseywheel terminal, it works, but I've not played much with gnuplot. The example is even readably self-documenting as an embedded here-doc, I like that. (I may be over-sensitized on that; Uri was sounding off on readability last night in his Boston.PM rehearsal of his YAPC talk.) Hiding the system() in a open("|gnuplot") that demos 5.6's autoviv FDs is even cooler.

In spirit of TMTOWTDI and CUFP, I rather like Stein's GD.pm and Verbruggen's GD::Graph wrapper for Boutell's libgd. Latest revs support TrueColor as well as palettized, and both PNG and JPeG (GIF is gone). I see there's even now a Template::Plugin::GD::Graph in the Template-Toolkit, which could be interesting for on-the-fly graphics (which I try to avoid, but could be useful if the data xor users are dynamic).

Cheers,
-- Bill N1VUX
If I post a few more times I should register, eh?

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Re: Graphics can be a force for good, and can be done in Perl
by BrowserUk (Patriarch) on May 21, 2003 at 21:11 UTC

    My comment was very much tongue in cheek.

    I hate blinking text, text-in-gifs and 30 seconds flash introductions with a vengence.

    I like my code syntax highlighted, as it adds another dimension, and allows the computer to do much of the work of ensuring I close my quotes, don't misspell my keywords, highlights variables that have only been seen once (usually typos) etc. That's what computers are for.

    As you say, when the graphic incorporates information not style, it is a definite plus.

    Oh go on with you..... it doesn't hurt! Join already.


    Examine what is said, not who speaks.
    "Efficiency is intelligent laziness." -David Dunham
    "When I'm working on a problem, I never think about beauty. I think only how to solve the problem. But when I have finished, if the solution is not beautiful, I know it is wrong." -Richard Buckminster Fuller

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