The JWAVE Contour Tool is a Bean that displays a contour plot.

See Using JWAVE Beans for information on using this Bean in the BeanBox.

This Tool uses up to three data arrays (z, x, and y) as input to the PV‑WAVE CONTOUR procedure.

z—A 2D array containing the values that make up the contour surface.

x—(optional) A 1D or 2D array specifying the x-coordinates for the contour surface.

y— (optional) A 1D or 2D array specifying the y-coordinates for the contour surface.

The JWAVE Beans provided by Rogue Wave each have a Customizer for modifying the appearance of the plot produced by the Bean. This section describes the features of the Contour Tool Customizer.

Grid On—When selected, a grid is displayed behind the contour.

Fill Contours—When selected, a color other than the background color is used to fill the areas between contour lines. When Fill Contours is selected, the intervals between the contour lines are filled with the contour line colors.

Number of Levels—Sets the number of equally-spaced contour levels that are produced. The maximum is 150. (Default: 6)

X Range—Sets the data range of the x-axis, a two-element vector. The first element is the axis minimum and the second is the maximum.

Y Range—Sets the data range of the y-axis, a two-element vector. The first element is the axis minimum and the second is the maximum.

Cell—The cell-drawing method, the default, examines each array cell and draws all contours emanating from that cell before proceeding to the next cell. This method is efficient in terms of computer resources but does not allow contour labeling.

Follow Method—The line-following method searches for each contour line and then follows the line until it reaches a boundary or closes. This method gives better looking results with dashed line styles and allows contour labeling, but requires more computer time.

Spline—Allows you to spline the contour lines. This function can be used when either the Follow method of contour drawing or Fill Contours is selected.

Splines are especially useful with small data sets (less than 15 array dimensions). With larger data sets the smoothing is not as noticeable and the expense of splines increases rapidly with the number of data points.

Spline Size—Specifies the length of each interpolated line segment in normalized coordinates. Smaller values for this parameter yield smoother lines, up to the resolution of the output device, at the expense of more computations. (Default: 0.005)

Interpolation (CONGRID)—When selected, applies interpolation, which shrinks or expands the number of elements in the contour by interpolating values at intervals where there might not have been values before.

Number of X Points—Sets number of columns desired in output image.

Number of Y Points—Sets number of rows desired in output image.

Title—Defines the text for the main title that appears centered above the plot. The text size of this main title is larger than the other text by a factor of 1.25.

Sub Title—Defines the text for the subtitle that appears underneath the x-axis.

X Axis Title—Defines the text for the title that appears below the x-axis.

Y Axis Title—Defines the text for the title that appears below the y-axis.

Character Size—Sets the overall character size for the annotation. A value of 1.0 is normal. The main title is written with a character size of 1.25 times this parameter.

Background Color—Brings up a color tool for selecting the background color of the plot.

Foreground Color—Brings up a color tool for selecting the foreground color of the plot.

Default Annotation—Labels the selected contour level with its elevation.

No Annotation—Turns off annotation of the selected contour level.

Special Annotation—Applies the specified annotation for the selected contour level. When the Special Annotation button is selected, you can enter annotation text in the text field located below the button.

Line Color—Brings up a color tool for selecting the line color for the selected level.

Fill Color—Brings up a color tool for selecting the fill color for the selected level.

Line Thickness—Sets the value for the thickness of the lines in the selected level. A value of 1.0 is normal thickness, 2.0 is double-wide, and so on.

Line Style—Sets the line style of the lines in the selected level. Choices are: Solid, Dotted, Dashed, Dash dot, Dash-dot-dot-dot, and Long dashes.