Here is the simple and easiest way to download the latest setup of Gnuplot. Gnuplot is a free and open source software that supports all major operating systems. It can be used to create two and three dimensional graphs of functions and data fits.
Unlike some similar software, gnuplot offers relatively few commands but a large number of options (see the set and show entries in the standard reference documentation). This chapter introduces some basic gnuplot functionality.
Table of Contents
Features
Gnuplot is a portable command-line driven graphing utility that allows scientists and students to visualize mathematical functions and data interactively. It is capable of displaying 2D and 3D plots that can be exported to several formats including postscript (including eps), pdf, png, gif, jpeg, LaTeX, metafont, svg and other formats. It also supports various specialized plot types such as contour maps and vector fields.
In addition to the ability to draw functions and data points on 2D or 3D plots, gnuplot has many other features such as a wide range of output formats, scripting capabilities, variables, text processing, functions, functions, linear and non-linear equation fitting and arbitrary pre-processing of input data across columns. It can also read data on the fly generated by other programs, called piping.
The program is useful for scientists, engineers and researchers in numerous scientific fields that imply working with large amounts of data. It can help them make more sense of the data they manage by making it easier to detect patterns and trends in the information through graphic representation.
Installation
Gnuplot is a portable command-line driven graphing utility for Linux, OS/2, MS Windows, Mac OSX and VMS. It can display 2D and 3D graphs, and is also capable of delivering animated views. It can read a wide variety of data formats, and can export plots to many file formats including postscript (including eps), pdf, png, jpeg, tiff, metafont, LaTeX, EPS and svg.
It can be viewed on an interactive screen via its cross-platform X11 or wxWidgets front end and also be directed to print output using a standard system printer. It can be controlled from a terminal using the command line, or from within a scripting language like Python with matplotlib.
Gnuplot is available for download from a variety of websites. The installation process is similar to that for most software, with various popup windows asking you to select install parameters. You can choose to have the gnuplot directory added to your path environment variable, which will allow you to run the program from anywhere on the command line.
Features
Gnuplot is compatible with many other software packages and can be used in combination with LaTeX to create professional-looking graphs. It can generate 2D and 3D plots of functions and data, do contour plots and perform non-linear data fitting. It also supports various linear and spherical coordinate systems, projections and geographic and time data presentation.
It can also generate EPS and PDF formats for inclusion in a document using the includegraphics command. gnuplot can also be used to produce vector images in EMF format, which can be imported into programs like LibreOffice and AutoCAD.
Unlike other freeware graphics plotting applications, gnuplot does not require any external libraries to run and is a fully-featured scripting environment with looping, functions, text processing and variables. Its source code is free and available to modify, however there are restrictions on further distribution of modified versions unless they are distributed under the same dual-license terms as the original gnuplot code (e.g. BSD + GPL).
Conclusions
Gnuplot is a powerful and flexible command-line driven graphing program that is free software, distributed under an OSI-approved license. It is capable of generating two- and three-dimensional plots of functions, data, and data fits. It can be used in interactive mode or in non-interactive scripting mode and can produce output to a variety of formats including postscript (including eps), png, jpg, svg, pdf, tif, metafont, and LaTeX.
The program is device-neutral and cares little about whether it is producing a preview for an X Window display, or a text version for use in a terminal. The plot commands work the same for all output modes.
Gnuplot accepts most mathematical expressions which can be evaluated in C, and it supports many complex arguments. It also supports the graphical operations * and **, and allows for line titles and point styles to be customized. The program has a wide range of options for including text in graphics and is easily integrated with LaTeX.