Re: 'with pixels' (was Re: Engines are started; ...)

[Hans-Bernhard B. <br...@ph...>]

Ethan A Merritt wrote:

> The code in datafile.c and elsewhere (df_readline is not so much
> the culprit here) makes an assumption that it can deduce the style of
> plot based on the number of input columns requested.  

Could you show a concrete example of that?

> I maintain that if a piece of code needs to know the
> current plot style it should look in the proper place, the plot structure,
> rather than trying to guess it from incomplete information.

*If* it needs them.  What I'm debating here is whether this need is 
real, rather than just a consequence of a design weakness.

> The second reason arose when I added the "datastrings" code
> that allows reading meta-information related to the plot from the datafile,
> including axis tic labels, plot key titles, and so on.   If you want to 
> argue that these are a bad idea, or propose a different way to 
> accomplish this, please feel free.  

That indeed is a valid reason.  I'm just still not convinced that we
should be passing in the entire plot struct for that, as opposed to
just those parts of it that the routines are actually going to 
manipulate.  We should try to keep those inter-linkages between
different parts of the program as narrow and focused as possible. 
Passing in the entire plot struct wholesale is the opposite of that.

-- 
Hans-Bernhard Broeker (br...@ph...)
Even if all the snow were burnt, ashes would remain.