Re: PGPLOT with Octave?

[John Eaton]

Kaj Wiik <address@hidden> wrote:

: Is anyone working on with attaching PGPLOT library to Octave?

Not that I know of.  I don't think I could accept changes for
including pgplot because of the copyright restrictions:

  * The PGPLOT library, both binary and source, and the PGPLOT manual   *
  * `PGPLOT Graphics Subroutine Library' are copyrighted, but available *
  * without fee for education, academic research and non-commercial     *
  * purposes. Ownership of the software remains with the California     *
  * Institute of Technology.  Users may distribute the binary and       *
  * source code to third parties provided that the copyright notice and *
  * this statement appears on all copies and that no charge is made for *
  * such copies.  Any entity wishing to integrate all or part of the    *
  * source code into a product for commercial use or resale should      *
  * contact the author at the above address.                            *

This is more restrictive than the GPL because it does not allow
commercial redistribution.  The GPL allows that, provided that the
source code is also distributed.  It also allows one to charge a
distribution fee.

Other possibilities for better plotting that I am looking at include
plplot and plotmtv.  plplot is now covered by the GPL, and plotmtv is
distributed under a very liberal copyright that allows just about
anything as long as the copyright notice is retained.

Right now I am leaning toward plplot because it supports lots of
output devices.  I like the interactive possibilites of plotmv, but
it appears that it might be possible to offer similar features with
plplot (there is an interactive driver that uses Tcl/Tk).

It also might not be too hard to make it possible to adapt any of
these plot libraries (though I really only plan to actually make one
work, my aim will be to make it relatively easy to switch out the
actual graphics package).

Improved plotting is something that is definitely on the list for 1.2
though I can't promise when it will be ready to be released.

Comments and other suggestions welcome.

Thanks,

jwe