Re: [R] Avoiding overplotting of text.

2008-02-26 Thread Gustaf Rydevik
On Mon, Feb 25, 2008 at 10:36 PM, hadley wickham [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
   I am plotting some data, and use text() to get variable names next to
points on the graph. What is the best way to make sure that these text
labels are readable and not overlapping when two datapoints are close?
I've tried using jitter(), but the effect is random and doesn't always
give a good result.
Any suggestions would be most appreciated.

  Have a look at pointLabel in maptools -
  http://finzi.psych.upenn.edu/R/library/maptools/html/pointLabel.html


  --
  http://had.co.nz/


Thank you, Hadley. That was a very good tool to find!
In conjunction to the  regular tricks mentioned by Rickard Cotton, and
thigmophobe by Jim Lemon, the problem turned out to be fairly easy.
This seem like one of those tasks that is needed fairly frequently,
but which is rarely bothered with. Would it be possible to add one of
these algorithms as an option to the regular text()?

Regards,

Gustaf


-- 
Gustaf Rydevik, M.Sci.
tel: +46(0)703 051 451
address:Essingetorget 40,112 66 Stockholm, SE
skype:gustaf_rydevik

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Re: [R] Avoiding overplotting of text.

2008-02-25 Thread Jim Lemon
Gustaf Rydevik wrote:
 Hi all,
 
 I am plotting some data, and use text() to get variable names next to
 points on the graph. What is the best way to make sure that these text
 labels are readable and not overlapping when two datapoints are close?
 I've tried using jitter(), but the effect is random and doesn't always
 give a good result.
 Any suggestions would be most appreciated.
 
Hi Gustaf,
Have a look at thigmophobe.labels in the plotrix package.

Jim

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Re: [R] Avoiding overplotting of text.

2008-02-25 Thread Richard . Cotton
 I am plotting some data, and use text() to get variable names next to
 points on the graph. What is the best way to make sure that these text
 labels are readable and not overlapping when two datapoints are close?
 I've tried using jitter(), but the effect is random and doesn't always
 give a good result.

It is probably possible to calculate the space that each label takes up on 
the page, and write some logic to automatically reposition the labels. 
This however is almost certainly very tricky to do properly.  The easier 
options are:

1. If you only have a few labels, and it's just one or two graphs, 
manually reposition them.
2. Make the text smaller and/or make the device size larger.
3. Draw the labels in different colours so that they can be distinguished 
even when they overlap.
4. Don't draw the labels on the plotting region; use a key instead.

Regards,
Richie.

Mathematical Sciences Unit
HSL



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Re: [R] Avoiding overplotting of text.

2008-02-25 Thread hadley wickham
  I am plotting some data, and use text() to get variable names next to
  points on the graph. What is the best way to make sure that these text
  labels are readable and not overlapping when two datapoints are close?
  I've tried using jitter(), but the effect is random and doesn't always
  give a good result.
  Any suggestions would be most appreciated.

Have a look at pointLabel in maptools -
http://finzi.psych.upenn.edu/R/library/maptools/html/pointLabel.html


-- 
http://had.co.nz/

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