# What do you use to Graph? Origin, Sigmaplot, Excel?



## boyfarrell (Jul 16, 2005)

Hi all,

I'm use scientific graphics packages / spreadsheets such as Origin and Sigmaplot. I hate using Excel because it looks so un-proffessional for papers, presentations etc. (I'm a research student)

I'm in the process of switching and was really disappointed to find out there isn't a MacOS version of Origin. What do you science types use for proffesional looking plots?

Cheers. Daniel.  

PS - I use MATLAB frequently but again prefer the look of plots produced by the graphical / spreadsheet packages. 

I'm all ears if you have and ideas.


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## Viro (Jul 16, 2005)

I use Matlab for most graphs. However, of late I have been slowly moving to using GNUPlot with AquaTerm. It provides some very nice looking graphs (better than MATLAB on OS X), though it isn't as comprehensive as Matlab's support for graphs.


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## MisterMe (Jul 16, 2005)

boyfarrell said:
			
		

> Hi all,
> 
> I'm use scientific graphics packages / spreadsheets such as Origin and Sigmaplot. I hate using Excel because it looks so un-proffessional for papers, presentations etc. (I'm a research student)
> 
> ...


Excel is a spreadsheet; it is not a graphing application. If graphing and curve-fitting is what you want, then it is very difficult to beat the power, price, and ease of use KaleidaGraph. If you can afford it, are willing to sacrifice a bit ease of use, and need almost uncompromised power, then the venerable Igor Pro produces textbook quality graphs. If you want a lower price than KaleidaGraph with comparable ease of use, arguably more power than Igor Pro in a Macintosh-exclusive application, then you absolutely must check out pro Fit.


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## boyfarrell (Jul 16, 2005)

Thanks for your help.

I found this nice screen-shot link to some of the GNUPlot:

http://ayapin.film.s.dendai.ac.jp/~matuda/Gnuplot/pm3d.html

The above packages look great. I'm downloading demos at the moment.

Thanks again. Daniel.


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## spb (Jul 25, 2005)

I use both matlab and gnuplot (in octave) for data analysis, but for publication quality figures I prefer xmgrace.  I find xmgrace a little more cumbersome to use, but worth the work for the final images.  

http://plasma-gate.weizmann.ac.il/Grace/


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## cfleck (Jul 26, 2005)

This has become my current selection.  But, you have to use python to generate them.  On the upside, you use it sort of like you would use matlab.

http://matplotlib.sourceforge.net/


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