Plot to PDF

[Ben Abbott]

On Jul 9, 2009, at 9:10 PM, Torquil Macdonald Sørensen wrote:

> Ben Abbott wrote:
>> On Jul 9, 2009, at 6:50 PM, Torquil Macdonald Sørensen wrote:
>>> Hi!
>>>
>>> When I plot to pdf in octave, the page format turns out wrong. The  
>>> resulting PDF
>>> looks like an A4 page, even though the actual plot is wider than  
>>> its height
>>> (standard format). I'm using octave 3.2 and the newest gnuplot  
>>> development
>>> snapshot. Plotting to PDF with gnuplot works fine using the  
>>> pdfcairo terminal.
>>>
>>> The command I have tried when plotting to pdf in octave is:
>>>
>>> fplot(blablabla...)
>>> print("plot.pdf")
>>>
>>> It works, apart from that page format issue. Anyone know how to do  
>>> it right? I'm
>>> using the octave3.2 from Debian Sid.
>>>
>>> Thanks
>>> Torquil Sørensen
>> It's not clear to me what you are seeing, or what you expect to  
>> see. So I'll explain what should happen and you can comment.
>> Both pdf an postscript output respect the papersize and  
>> paperposition properties.
>> The default are
>> papersize = [8.5, 11];
>> paperposition = [0.25, 2.5, 8.0, 6.0];
>> The resulting pdf/postscript output should (approximately) fill a  
>> 8x6 in box centered on a page of 8.5x11 inches.
>> If this is what you see, then all is working correctly.
>> If you'd like to produce a pdf to import into a LaTeX document (or  
>> a figure for a similar purpose), then try
>> set (gcf, "papersize", [6.4, 4.8])
>> set (gcf, "paperposition", [0, 0, 6.4, 4.8])
>> plot (1:10)
>> xlabel ("xlabel")
>> ylabel ("ylabel")
>> title ("title")
>> plot test.pdf
>> Ben
>>
>
> Thanks Ben, I will try to explain more thoroughly and provide some  
> files. When using the plot command, a window appears, with certain  
> dimensions. This window is a bit wider than it is tall. I would like  
> the PDF to have the same dimensions.
>
> When I use the print command to obtain an EPS file, the EPS has the  
> same aspect ratio as this window. When printing to PDF, there is  
> lots of extra white space above and below the plot. So the result is  
> not the same when printing to EPS and PDF. So printing to EPS gives  
> the desired result.
>
> (Btw, I assume you meant "print test.pdf", not "plot plot.pdf" in  
> your example code above)
>
> I have uploaded and EPS and a PDF so that the difference can be seen:
>
> * EPS example:
>
> plot (1:10)
> print plot.eps
>
> Result: http://folk.uio.no/tmac/plot.eps
>
> * PDF example:
>
> plot (1:10)
> print plot.pdf
>
> Result: http://folk.uio.no/tmac/plot.pdf
>
> The EPS has the format that I want, and which is the same as the  
> plot window displayed by octave after the plot command.
>
> The "set(gcf..." you included in the above has the following effect:
>
> EPS case: It affects the aspect ratio of the graphic, as well as the  
> paper format/size.
>
> PDF case: It affects only the graphic, not the page format/size of  
> the PDF file.
>
> Best regards
> Torquil Sørensen


Thanks for providing more detail.

The behavior of Octave is consistent with Matlab and is intended.

To obtain a pdf file that is the same size as the eps

	dpi = get (0, "screenpixelsperinch");
	pos = get (gcf, "position");
	papersize = pos(3:4)./dpi;
	set (gcf, "papersize", papersize)
	set (gcf, "paperposition", [0, 0, papersize])
	plot(1:10)
	print test.pdf

If you compare the the eps file, be sure your viewer clips the result  
at the bounding box. Otherwise, you'll see an additional 50pt border.

Ben