3-D graphing software?

[Antonio Olivares]

--- "Amadeus W.M." <amadeus84 at verizon.net> wrote:

> On Tue, 20 Nov 2007 01:47:07 +0200, Dotan Cohen
> wrote:
> 
> > In an advanced Calculus course, we are dealing
> with functions with 2
> > (and more) variables. Is there any 3-D graphing
> software for Fedora
> > available? Something like Kalgebra, but with a bit
> more functions such
> > as multiple functions graphed at the same time,
> asymptote min max and
> > other significant points, zoom into 3-D graph,
> graph of derivative and
> > integral, etc. Thanks in advance for any
> suggestions.
> > 
> > Dotan Cohen
> > 
> > http://what-is-what.com
> > http://gibberish.co.il
> >
>
א-ב-×’-ד-×”-ו-×–-×—-ט-×™-ך-×›-ל-ם-מ-ן-× -ס-×¢-×£-פ-×¥-צ-ק-ר-ש-ת
> > 
> > A: Because it messes up the order in which people
> normally read text. Q:
> > Why is top-posting such a bad thing?
> 
> Reading the thread I'm not exactly clear what you
> expect from an off-the-
> shelf GUI. The GUI is not psychic, nor does it
> understand spoken 
> commands. You have to tell it what to plot, and you
> have to do so in a 
> way it can understand. In other words, you must use
> certain commands and 
> syntax. That's a programming language.
> 
> There are two major professional-grade numerical
> programs: Matlab and 
> Mathematica. Neither is free nor open source, each
> with its own 
> strengths. I program in matlab for a living, and
> from experience I'd say 
> matlab is a better tradeoff between power and
> simplicity. It can do all 
> you want and, needless to say, much more. And the
> GUI is what you want a 
> GUI to be: can do multiple plots, zoom, pan, tilt,
> 2D, 3D, edit, 
> different illuminations, texture, colors, and things
> you never knew were 
> possible. If you're a student, you can get the
> student version for $100. 
> A very good investment if you're going down the
> Math/Engineering path.
> 
> Otherwise try Scilab, or octave, which is matlab's
> open source port (like 
> gimp and photoshop), which uses gnuplot for
> plotting. For one, you can't 
> rotate the graph by drag-and-drop as you can in
> matlab, and various other 
> shortcomings. 
> 
> 
> 
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I want to drop by my $.02 on this issue.  I personally
use maxima, xmaxima, or WxMaxima whenever I can, I
also have used sparingly octave as well because it is
the free version of matlab or provides a matlab kind
of environment.  However, you can also use
mathgv(http://www.mathgv.com/) or
winplot(http://math.exeter.edu/rparri) which are for
windows, but run nicely on linux with wine.  I know it
might not count since they are designed for windows,
but linux with wine does the job.  They have the gui
and you can rotate and do some nice things.  Only
drawback is the integrate/differentiate, for that
maxima does a pretty good job except for some very
nasty functions that the big
guys(Mathematica,Maple,et, all) also falter as well. 
I am in no way professional, but at one point had to
draw some very complex graphs, a college professor was
very nice and helpful using Mathematica, and I used it
on the college computers.  There are also java based
graphers on the net that you can find as well.  

Hope this helps,

Antonio 


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