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Downloading DATAPLOT Source Code for Unix Systems

Introduction Many Unix users will be able to download a pre-built Dataplot executable. However, there are cases in which you may need to build Dataplot from the source code:
  • We do not provide a Dataplot executable for your platform.
  • You are running an incompatible version of the operating system for a supported platform.
  • You would like to modify the size of the Dataplot work sheet (i.e., the maximum number of rows of data Dataplot can handle).
  • You would like to make local changes to the source code.
For any of these cases, you will need to download and compile the source code.
What You Need Dataplot is written primarily in Fortran. Code for certain device drivers is written in C. This means that you need the following on your local system:
  • A Fortran Fortran 90 compiler. I currently use gfortran for Unix/Linux platforms. If gfortran (or some other Fortran 90 compiler) is not available on your site, the gfortran compiler can be freely downloaded for most Unix/Linux sites.

  • You need the xlib library (and the xlib.h include file). This should be available on most Unix systems by default. Check with your local system adminstrator if you are not sure.

  • Dataplot can make use of the several auxillary libraries if they are available on your system:

    • The GD library can be used to generate plots in PNG, JPEG, and GIF format and to read images in these formats.

    • The readline/history libraries can be used to edit/recall previously entereed commands (Dataplot requires version 6 of the readline library).

    • The libplot library provides several additional plot formats not otherwise supported by Dataplot. This library is part of the plotutils package.

    On a first pass at the build, you may want to turn these off. Then if these libraries are available, you can build Dataplot with these libraries enabled. All of these libraries are freely downloadable if they are not currently available on your local system.

    These libraries provide useful capabilities, but none are essential to running Dataplot.

Files to Download There are two files to download:
  1. The current version of the Dataplot source files (Fortran files, C files, and include files, build script) (updated 10/08/2015).

    The following previous versions of the source code are also available:

  2. Script files for building Dataplot on Linux and Mac OS X platforms. The scripts for Linux should be easily adaptable to other Unix platforms. Both a c-shell and a Bourne shell version of the build script is provided.
You also need to download the Dataplot auxillary files.
Building Dataplot After Downloading Files
Step 1: Unpack Source/Script Files The first step is to upack the source and script files. If you have superuser priveleges, you may want to create the directory "/usr/local/src/dataplot" and move the source files to that directory. If not, you should create a new directory of your choice. One suggestion is ~/dataplot/src, but this is really your choice. Once you have moved the files to this directory, do the following:
  • gunzip dpsrc.tar.gz | tar -xf
  • gunzip dataplot_command.tar.gz | tar -xf
If you like, you can either remove or re-compress the two tar files.
Step 2: Edit and Run the Build Script The next step is to edit and run the build script.
  1. The size data sets that Dataplot can handle is determined by several PARAMETER statements in the file "DPCOPA.INC" (the build script actually copies "DPCOPA_LINUX.INC" to "DPCOPA.INC", so you will want to edit "DPCOPA_LINUX.INC"). Although this file sets many parameters, the only one you should potentially change is

    • MAXOBV - maximum number of observations per variable (default = 1,000,000)

    If you have a relatively new machine, then we recommend that you leave this value as is unless you know need to analyze very large data files (I have set it as high as 2,000,000). If you have an older machine with limited memory, you may want to set this value lower (either 200,000 or 100,000 is a recommended value).

  2. The following build scripts are available:

    • build_linux_gfortran.csh

      A build script for Linux using the c-shell and the gfortran compiler.

    • build_linux_gfortran.bash

      A build script for Linux using the Bourne shell and the gfortran compiler. This is included because many Linux sites no longer install the c-shell by default.

    • build_linux_g77

      A build script for Linux using the c-shell and the g77 compiler.

    If you have a non-Linux Unix system, these build scripts should be easily adapted to your system (the most likely difference is the Fortran compiler may not be gfortran).

    The build script is well commented. Read the comments to see what changes you need to make to the script. Most users should be able to just set the location for the source files and then just set the flags that indicate whether the GD, LIBPLOT, or READLINE libraries are available on your system.

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Date created: 06/05/2001
Last updated: 10/09/2015

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