Re: [Groff] Business Graphics

[Ralph Corderoy]

Hi Deri,

> Its purpose is to provide inline "business type" graphs for groff. I
> know we have grap which seems to be aimed at the more mathematical end
> of graphs, I'm aiming for the sort of graphs which a typical office
> spreadsheet might produce.

Interesting.  I dislike 3D-ness being added as it seems fluff and
clutter to me, but I realise it's sought after by some (hind) quarters.
:-)  Keeping it on topic, Bell Labs were amongst those to criticise pie
charts generally compared to other representations.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pie_chart#Use.2C_effectiveness_and_visual_perception

On a related note, I found this an interesting read recently.

    Beyond Bar and Line Graphs: Time for a New Data Presentation
    Paradigm

    Papers rarely included scatterplots, box plots, and histograms that
    allow readers to critically evaluate continuous data. Most papers
    presented continuous data in bar and line graphs. This is
    problematic, as many different data distributions can lead to the
    same bar or line graph. The full data may suggest different
    conclusions from the summary statistics

    http://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371/journal.pbio.1002128
    PDF available.

> If you have time please have a look and if you have any good ideas for
> improvements or additions, post them back to the list.

I think most preprocessors pass on their bracketing pseudo macros to
their output so the author has the option of defining them?

I spotted a few minor things on a quick look, e.g. not stealing my
.BGSIWASHEREFIRST.  Patch below.

Cheers, Ralph.


diff -ru busgrap-20150523.orig/busgrap.pl busgrap-20150523/busgrap.pl
--- busgrap-20150523.orig/busgrap.pl    2015-05-23 16:40:39.000000000 +0100
+++ busgrap-20150523/busgrap.pl 2015-05-24 12:48:48.000000000 +0100
@@ -643,7 +643,7 @@
     chomp;
     s/\r$//;
     
-    if (m'^\.\s*BGS\s*(\w*)')
+    if (m'^\.\s*BGS(?:\s+(\w+))?')
     {
        my $type=($1)?$1:'pi';
        $InBG=1;
@@ -720,7 +720,7 @@
        }
        else
        {
-           Log(0,$ln,"Redefined command '$cmd'") if exists($grph{$cmd});
+           Log(0,"$ln: Redefined command '$cmd'") if exists($grph{$cmd});
            address@hidden;
        }
     }
@@ -804,7 +804,7 @@
                        }
                        else
                        {
-                           Log(0,"Colour names ($v) not found");
+                           Log(0,"Colour not found: $v");
                        }
                        
                        if ($cmd eq 'SCOLOURS')
@@ -1189,7 +1189,7 @@
     }
     else
     {
-       Log(1,$ln,"Unknown scaling factor '$unit'");
+       Log(1,"$ln: Unknown scaling factor '$unit'");
     }
 }
 
@@ -1209,7 +1209,7 @@
     my $shadh=int($shadv/2);
     my $usey=$grph{FRAME}->[1];
     my $usex=$grph{FRAME}->[0];
-    Log(1,0,"No Series data found") if $#data == -1;
+    Log(1,"No Series data found") if $#data == -1;
     
     my (@wdgs)=(@data);
     
@@ -2600,4 +2600,4 @@
     my $t=$$v1;
     $$v1=$$v2;
     $$v2=$t;
-}
\ No newline at end of file
+}
diff -ru busgrap-20150523.orig/Introduction.trf 
busgrap-20150523/Introduction.trf
--- busgrap-20150523.orig/Introduction.trf      2015-05-23 16:40:39.000000000 
+0100
+++ busgrap-20150523/Introduction.trf   2015-05-24 12:40:04.000000000 +0100
@@ -48,7 +48,7 @@
 .HD Introduction
 The busgrap pre-processor is intended to let you embed business type graphics 
within the flow of your groff document. All the graphics are produced using 
groff's native drawing primitives, so the results are pure vector based 
drawings, no bit mapped graphics.
 ..sp .5
-Each graph quires you to embed a call to macro ".BGS" followed by a set of 
parameters, described below, which are terminated by a call to ".BGE". Between 
these two macro calls only busgrap parameters are expected, any normal groff 
language will cause an error.
+Each graph requires you to embed a call to macro ".BGS" followed by a set of 
parameters, described below, which are terminated by a call to ".BGE". Between 
these two macro calls only busgrap parameters are expected, any normal groff 
language will cause an error.
 ..sp .5
 The format of the ".BGS" parameter is:-
 .CODE
@@ -56,8 +56,6 @@
 .ENDCODE
 Where 'name' can be "pi" or "graph". The difference determines whether the 
graph will be a pie chart or a line/bar chart.
 .sp .5
-In order to place a graph in the document you need to specify a "frame" which 
will contain the actual graph when it is generated. 
-.sp .5
 .HD The Frame
 In order to place a graph in the document you need to specify a "frame" which 
will contain the actual graph when it is generated. Busgrap will try to fit 
your graph within the given frame, but it is not very intelligent so it may not 
be successful in keeping within the frame, if this happens, increase the size 
of the frame until it is successful, or reduce the size of labels, etc..
 .sp .5