Commerical graphing packages?

[Erik Johnson]

I am wanting to generate dynamic graphs for our website and would rather
not invest the time in developing the code to draw these starting from
graphics primitives. I am looking for something that is... "fairly robust"
but our needs are relatively modest: X-Y scatter plots w/ data point
symbols, multiple data set X-Y line plots, bar charts, etc.

Preferably this would come from a company that can provide support &
decent documentation, and a package that can be installed without a bunch of
extra hassle (e.g., needs Numeric Python, needs to have the GD library
installed, needs separate JPEG encoders, font libraries, etc.)

I am aware of ChartDirector (http://www.advsofteng.com/ ) which
explicitly supports python and seems to be about the right level of
sophistication. I don't really know of any other packages in this space, do
you? I am seeking feedback and reccomendations from people who have used
this package or similar ones. I am particularly interested to hear about any
limitations or problems you ran into with whatever package you are using.

Thanks for taking the time to read my post! :)

-ej

[Larry Bates]

Re: Commerical graphing packages?

ReportLab has pretty good Graphics Module. About the only thing
it needs is Python Imaging Library (which you would probably
want anyway).

Larry Bates


Erik Johnson wrote:[color=blue]
> I am wanting to generate dynamic graphs for our website and would rather
> not invest the time in developing the code to draw these starting from
> graphics primitives. I am looking for something that is... "fairly robust"
> but our needs are relatively modest: X-Y scatter plots w/ data point
> symbols, multiple data set X-Y line plots, bar charts, etc.
>
> Preferably this would come from a company that can provide support &
> decent documentation, and a package that can be installed without a bunch of
> extra hassle (e.g., needs Numeric Python, needs to have the GD library
> installed, needs separate JPEG encoders, font libraries, etc.)
>
> I am aware of ChartDirector (http://www.advsofteng.com/ ) which
> explicitly supports python and seems to be about the right level of
> sophistication. I don't really know of any other packages in this space, do
> you? I am seeking feedback and reccomendations from people who have used
> this package or similar ones. I am particularly interested to hear about any
> limitations or problems you ran into with whatever package you are using.
>
> Thanks for taking the time to read my post! :)
>
> -ej
>
>[/color]

[18k11tm001@sneakemail.com]

Re: Commerical graphing packages?

Check out GRACE. It's not specifically designed for Python, but I've
been using with Python for a couple of years or more. I'm very happy
with it, and it's free. It works both interactively and in batch mode.
Do a google on GRACE.

[Erik Johnson]

Re: Commerical graphing packages?

Thank you both for your input. I will check them out. :)

-ej

[Vincent Wehren]

Re: Commerical graphing packages?

Erik Johnson wrote:[color=blue]
> I am aware of ChartDirector (http://www.advsofteng.com/ ) which
> explicitly supports python and seems to be about the right level of
> sophistication. I don't really know of any other packages in this space, do
> you? I am seeking feedback and reccomendations from people who have used
> this package or similar ones. I am particularly interested to hear about any
> limitations or problems you ran into with whatever package you are using.[/color]

We use both the Python and C++ bindings of ChartDirector (although their
license always spans /all/ supported bindings. It's all pretty
straight-forward, well-documented, and the license fee is a bargain
compared to other packages we've used in the past. What it is not
suitable for is maybe allowing for 3d-views of data cubes - changeable
on the fly.

--
Vincent Wehren

[John J. Lee]

Re: Commerical graphing packages?

18k11tm001@snea kemail.com writes:
[color=blue]
> Check out GRACE. It's not specifically designed for Python, but I've
> been using with Python for a couple of years or more. I'm very happy
> with it, and it's free. It works both interactively and in batch mode.
> Do a google on GRACE.[/color]

If you're generating lots of graphs programatically , eg. on a web
server, grace is not what you want. Yes, it has a command language,
but IIRC it depends on X11, and windows even pop up as it runs in
batch mode. Bleh.

Gets the job done for interactive editing of publication-quality
scientific graphs, though.


John

[Francis Gadenne]

Re: Commerical graphing packages?

Erik Johnson wrote:
[color=blue]
>I am wanting to generate dynamic graphs for our website and ...
>I am aware of ChartDirector (http://www.advsofteng.com/ ) which[/color]

I have used ChartDirector extensively as an activeX (not from
python though). We found the API to be well-though and clean.

The tool is definitely worth the value. Simple to use and productive.
It saved us a lot of time. A great product.

François

[18k11tm001@sneakemail.com]

Re: Commerical graphing packages?

>If you're generating lots of graphs programatically , eg. on a web[color=blue]
>server, grace is not what you want. Yes, it has a command language,
>but IIRC it depends on X11, and windows even pop up as it runs in
>batch mode. Bleh.[/color]

I don't understand what you're talking about. I've been using GRACE in
batch mode for years and I've never had a window pop up. The only time
a window "pops up" is when you start GRACE interactively.

The GRACE command language is not the greatest, but it gets the job
done. It may have improved lately too (I run a fairly old version).

Another nice feature of GRACE is a fairly active user community and a
mailing list for help. They helped get me unstuck several times a while
back.

[John J. Lee]

Re: Commerical graphing packages?

18k11tm001@snea kemail.com writes:
[color=blue][color=green]
> >If you're generating lots of graphs programatically , eg. on a web
> >server, grace is not what you want. Yes, it has a command language,
> >but IIRC it depends on X11, and windows even pop up as it runs in
> >batch mode. Bleh.[/color]
>
> I don't understand what you're talking about. I've been using GRACE in
> batch mode for years and I've never had a window pop up. The only time
> a window "pops up" is when you start GRACE interactively.[/color]

Hmm, I guess I was actually using grace_np.py rather than batch
mode... it was a few years ago I last used it.

[color=blue]
> The GRACE command language is not the greatest, but it gets the job
> done. It may have improved lately too (I run a fairly old version).
>
> Another nice feature of GRACE is a fairly active user community and a
> mailing list for help. They helped get me unstuck several times a while
> back.[/color]

....and some nasty features are the rather nasty GUI (at least, I found
it awkward) and the fact that it's the only X11 application I've used
that ever managed to crash my whole X desktop.


John

[David Fraser]

Re: Commerical graphing packages?

Erik Johnson wrote:[color=blue]
> I am wanting to generate dynamic graphs for our website and would rather
> not invest the time in developing the code to draw these starting from
> graphics primitives. I am looking for something that is... "fairly robust"
> but our needs are relatively modest: X-Y scatter plots w/ data point
> symbols, multiple data set X-Y line plots, bar charts, etc.
>
> Preferably this would come from a company that can provide support &
> decent documentation, and a package that can be installed without a bunch of
> extra hassle (e.g., needs Numeric Python, needs to have the GD library
> installed, needs separate JPEG encoders, font libraries, etc.)
>
> I am aware of ChartDirector (http://www.advsofteng.com/ ) which
> explicitly supports python and seems to be about the right level of
> sophistication. I don't really know of any other packages in this space, do
> you? I am seeking feedback and reccomendations from people who have used
> this package or similar ones. I am particularly interested to hear about any
> limitations or problems you ran into with whatever package you are using.
>
> Thanks for taking the time to read my post! :)[/color]

It's worth checking out matplotlib as well although it may not meet all
your criteria ... but have a look, its a great package

[Francis Girard]

Re: Commerical graphing packages?

Le lundi 14 Février 2005 11:02, David Fraser a écrit :[color=blue]
> Erik Johnson wrote:[color=green]
> > I am wanting to generate dynamic graphs for our website and would
> > rather not invest the time in developing the code to draw these starting
> > from graphics primitives. I am looking for something that is... "fairly
> > robust" but our needs are relatively modest: X-Y scatter plots w/ data
> > point symbols, multiple data set X-Y line plots, bar charts, etc.
> >
> > Preferably this would come from a company that can provide support &
> > decent documentation, and a package that can be installed without a bunch
> > of extra hassle (e.g., needs Numeric Python, needs to have the GD library
> > installed, needs separate JPEG encoders, font libraries, etc.)
> >
> > I am aware of ChartDirector (http://www.advsofteng.com/ ) which
> > explicitly supports python and seems to be about the right level of
> > sophistication. I don't really know of any other packages in this space,
> > do you? I am seeking feedback and reccomendations from people who have
> > used this package or similar ones. I am particularly interested to hear
> > about any limitations or problems you ran into with whatever package you
> > are using.
> >
> > Thanks for taking the time to read my post! :)[/color]
>
> It's worth checking out matplotlib as well although it may not meet all
> your criteria ... but have a look, its a great package[/color]

PyX might also be interesting, depending on your needs.

Regards

Francis Girard

[John Hunter]

Re: Commerical graphing packages?

>>>>> "Francis" == Francis Girard <francis.girard @free.fr> writes:

Francis> PyX might also be interesting, depending on your needs.

While pyx is a very nice package, it is probably not a good choice for
web app developers simply because it generates postscript, which is
not very browser friendly. Once could send the PS through a converter
such as ImageMagick, but it would probably be better to use a library
that generates browser friendly output natively.

matplotlib on the other hand, *does* work in web app servers, and
generates PNG/SVG natively. See

http://matplotlib.sourceforge.net/faq.html#APPSERVER

Although it is a free and open source package, I think that the image
quality and support is on par with if not superior to what you find in
many commercial solutions. If the OP wants commercial support, he
might consider contacting the developer off-list :-)

JDH

[Robert Kern]

Re: Commerical graphing packages?

John Hunter wrote:
[color=blue]
> Although it is a free and open source package, I think that the image
> quality and support is on par with if not superior to what you find in
> many commercial solutions.[/color]

Amen to that. The ChartDirector demos looked very ugly to my eye.
matplotlib plots usually look quite good without any tweaking.

--
Robert Kern
rkern@ucsd.edu

"In the fields of hell where the grass grows high
Are the graves of dreams allowed to die."
-- Richard Harter