This issue of Linux Journal marks the magazine's 25th anniversary. So, I thought I'd look back to see when I wrote my first article, and I was horrified to see that it was in 2000. I'm too young to have been writing articles for more than 18 years! Here's to another 25 years for Linux Journal and all of the authors who have made it what it is.
For this article, let's take a look at the KmPlot plotting program. KmPlot is part of the EDU suite of programs from the KDE project, and it was designed to plot functions and interact with them to learn about their behavior. Since it is a part of the KDE project, it should exist in most package management systems. For example, in Debian-based systems, you can install it with the command:
sudo apt-get install kmplot
When you first start KmPlot, you'll see a blank workspace where you can start to play with mathematical functions. On the right-hand side, there's a main plot window where all of the graphical display will happen. On the left-hand side, there's a function list window where you can find all of the functions you've defined and are planning on working with.
Figure 1. Upon start up, you can begin entering functions and learning about their behavior.
The first thing to do is create some functions to use from within KmPlot. Click the Create button at the bottom of the function window to bring up a drop-down menu. Here you can select from a number of plot types, such as Cartesian, polar or differential. As an example, clicking the Cartesian option opens a new window where you can create your function.
Figure 2. You can use the built-in palettes to select functions and constants to build up the functions that you are interested in.
You can use pre-defined constants and simpler functions to build up the specific function you want to study. Once you're finished, KmPlot will update the main window, and you'll see your plot generated.
Several defaults exist that you can assign in terms of its appearance. Click the Advanced button at the bottom of the left-hand pane to open a new dialog window where you can change some of the defaults.
Figure 3. Click the Advanced button to set several options in the plot window.
from Linux Journal - The Original Magazine of the Linux Community http://bit.ly/2IU2VbL
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