[SOLVED] db.plot

[Jeffrey Yarus]

When using name.prop in order to plot a proportional basemap, is there an argument to control the proportional scaling? The large dots are too large, for example, and I would like them to be smaller...

[Didier Renard]

Hi

I understand that you wish to control the dimension of the samples represented using the proportional representation.
First let me tell you that the answered can be found in the on-line help. To trigger the help for a function "foo", we must simply type:
?foo

However, for few functions, called generic, this is not the correct solution. This is the case, in particular, for the plot function. You have to remember that "plot" is a generic name ... the name of the plot function dedicated to the representation of a data base ("db") is called db.plot
Then, to get the help specific to the graphic representation of a data base, you must type:
?db.plot

You will then discover the series of parameters that are available for this graphic representation. More precisely, the proportional representation has its specific documentation for its specific arguments.... among which:
- cex0 it the size given to the smallest values
- cex1 is the size given to the largest values

I suppose that these are the parameters that you were looking for.

[Jeffrey Yarus]

I'm having a bit of a hard time figuring out how to control the size of various things inside some of the functions. Thank you for clarifying how to change the proportional sizes in db.plot. So, now I want to change the font size title and axes when I use draw.xvalid. I should be able to change the titles, font size, etc. I see the arguments, and it points me to db.plot for other options, but adding an argument inside the draw.xvalid function seems very limited... I can increase or decrease proportional symbols, I can increase or decrease the number of bins in a histogram, I cas select the mode, but I cannot seem to figure out how to change the font size in the title or the axes. Any suggestions here would be helpful.

[Didier Renard]

Hi Jeffrey.
Unfortunately, I must confess that your are right in your post.
In the graphic functions that I have conceived, I forgot to let mute arguments (denoted as '...') be passed to internal functions. For example, if the '...' had been passed through the whole stack of functions down to the title() function, then you could have used the argument 'font.main' or 'font.xsub' to manage the size of the fonts used for title or labels on the axes.
But this has not been done. It could be added although:
- we are not planing to improve the graphic features of RGeostats as I plan to call functions from ggplot package rather than the basic functions that I used initially: they offer much more powerful feature.
- the management of '...' argument is not very well coded (this is my perception at least) as if such argument is passed to 2 internal graphic functions, an error message is issued is one argument is not recognized by a graphic function. This is a severe restriction to using the '...' every possible time.

[Didier Renard]

Let me slightly correct my previous reply.
The title cannot be parametrized in the current version (size, color, font type). This remains true.
For the axes and the labels, I was wrong, you can use the following arguments (that you simply provide in place of '...'): hety will be carried along the function stack down to the relevant place (i.e. par() function) where they will be honored. These arguments are (among other ... read the par manual):
- cex.axis for the size of the symbols on axes
- cex.col for the color of the symbols on axes
- cex.lab for the label on the axes
- cex.col for the label on the axes
Thanks for your help

PS: The title parametrization will be corrected in next version

[Jeffrey Yarus]

Thank you, this does help!