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Re: opening .gp file ...newbie user

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In article <d5422ba3-c6d7-404a-b2aa-9f80682dcc88@googlegroups.com>, 
david@artandconservation.net says...
> 
> To be honest I also got the actual data and photo of the plot. I got 
> the following files: png, eps, gp, csv. So I need more than one file 
> to open the plot in Gnuplot?!

The csv-file (comma-separated value) is likely an ASCII-file of the data 
(https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc4180), under windows you can open it 
with spreadsheet-programs like MS Excel or Libre-Office Calc.

png (portable network graphics) and eps (encapsulated postscript) are 
likely graphics files, under windows you can open them with graphics 
viewers like Irfan-view (www.irfanview.com). For eps you will need in 
addition a matching version  (32 or 64 bit) of a postscript-interpreter 
like Ghostscript https://www.ghostscript.com/). When you get 
Ghostscript, get the graphical user interface Ghostview at the samne 
time. 

gp may  be the Gnuplot-script to convert the data file into the graphics 
file. You can open it with any text editior, the one that comes with 
windows is perfectly fine for the time being. For routine use of Gnuplot 
you will appreciate the comfort of a programming editor with Gnuplot-
mode (offering code coompletion, syntax highlighting and the like), but 
for now that is not required. You can also run it through Gnuplot, of 
course, to make your own graphics (make sure the graphics that came from 
your friend are in a save place, where they connot be overwritten). 

Except Excel, all these programs are free or even opensource. They all 
come with a manual, and you have to RTFM. Once you get the hang of 
Gnuplot, check http://www.phyast.pitt.edu/%Ezov1/gnuplot/html/intro.html 
and http://lowrank.net/gnuplot/misc4-e.html to see how powerful it 
really is. 

As for user-friendly, once you understand how Gnuplot works, it is 
straight-forward to get graphs quicker and of higher quality than with 
any spreadsheet program I know of. 

However, the biggest advantage of Gnuplot for plotting (as well as LaTeX 
for typesetting) is that all data are in plain ASCII. At the time I 
wrote my thesis (end '80s) most of my colleagues used a program called 
'wordstar', which produced binary files just like MS-Word does today. 
They would be hard pressed to open their files today, as wordstar is no 
longer available. My LaTeX-documents with Gnuplot-graphics are still 
fully accessible after 30 years (even though the old-fashioned syntax 
produces a few warnings (LaTeX) or errors (Gnuplot)). 


-- 
DIN EN ISO 9241-13: 9.5.3 Error messages should convey what is wrong, 
what corrective actions can be taken, and the cause of the error.

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opening .gp file ...newbie user david@artandconservation.net - 2018-02-27 23:03 -0800
  Re: opening .gp file ...newbie user Karl Ratzsch <mail.kfr@gmx.net> - 2018-02-28 08:48 +0100
    Re: opening .gp file ...newbie user david@artandconservation.net - 2018-02-28 03:11 -0800
      Re: opening .gp file ...newbie user Colin Brough <Colin.Brough@blueyonder.co.uk> - 2018-02-28 11:52 +0000
      Re: opening .gp file ...newbie user Jörg Buchholz <bookwood4new@freenet.de> - 2018-02-28 13:39 +0100
        Re: opening .gp file ...newbie user david@artandconservation.net - 2018-02-28 05:48 -0800
          Re: opening .gp file ...newbie user Jörg Buchholz <bookwood4new@freenet.de> - 2018-02-28 15:28 +0100
          Re: opening .gp file ...newbie user Björn Lundin <b.f.lundin@gmail.com> - 2018-03-01 10:38 +0100
      Re: opening .gp file ...newbie user Dr Engelbert Buxbaum <engelbert_buxbaum@hotmail.com> - 2018-04-10 12:18 +0200

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