SigmaPlot® 8.0
User’s Guide
For more information about SPSS® Science software products, please visit our WWW site
at http://www.spss.com or contact
SPSS Science Marketing Department
SPSS Inc.
233 South Wacker Drive, 11th Floor
Chicago, IL 60606-6307
Tel: (312) 651-3000
Fax: (312) 651-3668
SPSS and SigmaPlot are registered trademarks and the other product names are the
trademarks of SPSS Inc. for its proprietary computer software. No material describing such
software may be produced or distributed without the written permission of the owners of
the trademark and license rights in the software and the copyrights in the published
materials.
The SOFTWARE and documentation are provided with RESTRICTED RIGHTS. Use,
duplication, or disclosure by the Government is subject to restrictions as set forth in
subdivision (c)(1)(ii) of The Rights in Technical Data and Computer Software clause at
52.227-7013. Contractor/manufacturer is SPSS Inc., 233 South Wacker Drive, 11th Floor,
Chicago, IL 60606-6307.
General notice: Other product names mentioned herein are used for identification purposes
only and may be trademarks of their respective companies.
Windows is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corporation.
ImageStream® Graphics & Presentation Filters, copyright © 1991-1997 by INSO Corporation.
All Rights Reserved.
ImageStream Graphics Filters is a registered trademark and ImageStream is a trademark of INSO
Corporation.
SigmaPlot® 8.0 User’s Guide
Copyright © 2002 by SPSS Inc.
All rights reserved.
Printed in the United States of America.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted,
in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or
otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 05 04 03 02 01 00
ISBN 1-56827-232-4
iii
Contents
Introduction ................................................................................ 9
New Features in SigmaPlot 8.0 .................................................................................. 10
Installing SigmaPlot ................................................................................................... 12
Using SigmaPlot in Windows ..................................................................................... 14
Using Toolbars ........................................................................................................... 15
Setting Program Options ............................................................................................ 18
Anatomy of SigmaPlot Graphs ................................................................................... 22
SigmaPlot Help .......................................................................................................... 32
Getting Technical Support .......................................................................................... 32
Using This Manual ..................................................................................................... 33
Contacting SPSS Inc. ................................................................................................. 33
References ................................................................................................................. 34
Notebook Basics .......................................................................... 37
SigmaPlot Notebook Structure ................................................................................... 37
Managing Notebook Sections .................................................................................... 40
Creating New Notebook Files and Items .................................................................... 41
Renaming Notebook Files and Items .......................................................................... 43
Opening Notebook Files and Items ........................................................................ 44
Copying, Pasting and Removing Notebook Items ...................................................... 45
Saving Your Work ..................................................................................................... 46
Exporting Notebooks and Notebook Items ................................................................. 46
Printing Notebook Items ............................................................................................ 49
Worksheet Basics ........................................................................ 53
Setting Worksheet Display Options ............................................................................ 54
Moving Around the Worksheet ................................................................................... 55
Entering Data into a SigmaPlot Worksheet ................................................................. 57
Importing Files from Other Applications .................................................................... 58
Exporting Worksheet Data .......................................................................................... 62
Descriptive Statistics for Worksheets ........................................................................ 63
Displaying Worksheet Data ........................................................................................ 66
Selecting a Block of Data ............................................................................................ 75
Sorting Data ............................................................................................................... 77
Cutting, Copying, Pasting, Moving, and Deleting Data ............................................... 78
Inserting Blocks of Cells, Columns, and Rows of Data ............................................... 78
Deleting Blocks of Cells, Columns, and Rows of Data ................................................ 80
Contents
iv
Switching Rows to Columns .......................................................................................81
Removing Outliers and Other Data ..............................................................................81
Entering and Promoting Column and Row Titles ........................................................85
Using Excel Workbooks in SigmaPlot .........................................................................88
Graph Page Basics ...................................................................... 95
Setting Page Options ..................................................................................................96
Working with Page Objects .........................................................................................97
Adding Another Graph to a Page ...............................................................................102
Zooming In and Out ..................................................................................................103
Using Graph Pages as Templates .............................................................................105
Cutting, Copying and Pasting Graphs and other Page Objects ..................................111
Using OLE to Paste, Link, and Embed Objects ..........................................................112
Dragging and Dropping Graphs ................................................................................122
Hiding and Deleting Objects from the Page ..............................................................123
Drawing Objects on the Page ....................................................................................125
Modifying Object Colors and Lines ...........................................................................127
Moving and Sizing Graphs and Objects ....................................................................131
Moving Objects to the Front or Back .........................................................................134
Grouping and Ungrouping Objects ...........................................................................135
Aligning Page Objects ...............................................................................................135
Working with Grids and Rulers .................................................................................136
Arranging Graphs .....................................................................................................137
Working with Text on the Page .................................................................................143
Working with Automatic Legends .............................................................................148
Changing Graph Page Format ...................................................................................154
Using Custom Colors ................................................................................................158
Creating and Modifying Graphs ......................................................163
Setting Graph Defaults ..............................................................................................164
SigmaPlot Graph Types ............................................................................................165
SigmaPlot Graph Style .............................................................................................167
Creating Graphs ........................................................................................................177
Using Templates, Layouts, and the Graph Style Gallery ............................................182
Creating Graphs Using the Graph Style Gallery .........................................................182
Creating and Modifying Embedded SigmaPlot Graphs .............................................186
Creating SigmaPlot Graphs Using SPSS ...................................................................188
Creating SigmaPlot Graphs Using MicroSoft Excel ...................................................189
Modifying Graphs ....................................................................................................189
Selecting a Graph or a Plot ......................................................................................191
Naming Plots ............................................................................................................192
Contents
v
Naming Graphs ....................................................................................................... 194
Picking Different Data for the Current Plot ............................................................... 194
Changing Graph Type and Style .............................................................................. 195
Adding New Plots ..................................................................................................... 196
Showing, Hiding, and Deleting Plots ........................................................................ 199
Sampling Fewer Data Points .................................................................................... 201
Plotting Missing and Out of Axis Range Data Points ................................................ 203
Changing Symbol Type and Other Symbol Options .................................................. 204
Changing Line Type and Other Line Options ............................................................ 213
Changing Patterns and Fill Colors ............................................................................ 216
Using Custom Symbol, Fill, Line, and Color Increments ......................................... 220
Changing Bar and Box Widths and Spacing ............................................................. 222
Adding and Modifying Drop Lines ............................................................................ 226
Plotting and Solving Equations ................................................................................ 228
Working with 2D Graphs .............................................................. 237
2D Plot Types ........................................................................................................... 238
Arranging Data for a 2D Plot .................................................................................... 240
Creating 2D Plots .................................................................................................... 243
Creating Multiple Curves .......................................................................................... 244
Creating 2D Scatter Plots with Error Bars ................................................................ 245
Creating 2D Plots with Asymmetric Error Bars ........................................................ 249
Creating Error Bar Plots Using Category Data .......................................................... 252
Modifying Error Bars ................................................................................................ 253
Grouped Bar Charts ................................................................................................. 261
Creating Box Plots .................................................................................................... 265
Computing Percentile Methods ................................................................................ 268
Creating Area Plots .................................................................................................. 269
Bubble Plots ............................................................................................................. 279
Creating Multiple 2D Axes ........................................................................................ 283
Working with 3D and Contour Graphs ............................................... 287
3D Plots .................................................................................................................. 287
Arranging Data for Contour Plots and 3D Graphs .................................................... 289
Creating 3D Scatter Plots and 3D Bar Charts ........................................................... 293
Creating Trajectory Plots .......................................................................................... 294
Creating Waterfall Plots ............................................................................................ 295
Creating Mesh Plots ................................................................................................. 297
Modifying Mesh Lines and Fill Color ........................................................................ 298
Changing Graph Perspective, Rotation, and Shading ............................................... 299
3D Graph Axis Placement ......................................................................................... 303
Contents
vi
Frame Lines for a 3D Graph ......................................................................................304
Creating Contour Plots ..............................................................................................306
Modifying Contour Plots ..........................................................................................308
Working with Pie, Polar, and Ternary Plots ........................................317
Pie Charts .................................................................................................................318
Polar Plots ................................................................................................................323
Modifying Polar Axes ................................................................................................326
Changing Angular Axis Scaling and Position ............................................................327
Modifying Radial Axes Lines and Position ................................................................330
Displaying and Changing Radial Axis Ticks and Labels .............................................332
Ternary Graphs .........................................................................................................334
Modifying Ternary Axes ............................................................................................338
Modifying Ternary Axis Title Location .......................................................................339
Changing Ternary Axis Range, Scale, and Direction .................................................340
Changing Ternary Axis Tick Marks and Tick Labels ..................................................345
Publishing Graphs ......................................................................353
Publishing Graphs on the World Wide Web ..............................................................353
Submitting Graphs for Publication ............................................................................356
Publication Tips and Tricks .......................................................................................359
Modifying Axes, Tick Marks, and Grids .............................................361
Changing Axis Range ................................................................................................362
Changing Axis Scales ................................................................................................363
Changing Scale Type ................................................................................................366
Hiding, Displaying, and Deleting Axes ......................................................................370
Moving Axes .............................................................................................................371
Changing Axis Line, Color, and Thickness ...............................................................372
Setting Axis Breaks ...................................................................................................374
Working with Axis Titles and Tick Labels ..................................................................375
Changing Tick Mark Intervals ...................................................................................378
Changing Tick Mark Appearance ...............................................................................383
Customizing Tick Intervals ........................................................................................385
Changing Tick Labels ................................................................................................387
Displaying Grid Lines and Backplanes ......................................................................396
Statistics .................................................................................401
Running Paired and Independent t-Tests ..................................................................401
Creating Histograms .................................................................................................403
Plotting and Modifying Regression Lines .................................................................407
Contents
vii
Transform Basics ....................................................................... 417
Performing Quick Transforms .................................................................................. 419
Smoothing 2D and 3D Data ...................................................................................... 420
Using the Report Editor ............................................................... 429
Creating Reports ...................................................................................................... 429
Setting Report Options ............................................................................................. 430
Setting Report Page Size and Margins ..................................................................... 430
Using the Report Editor Ruler .................................................................................. 432
Setting Tabs ............................................................................................................. 432
Setting