Searching for Plotting Software for Windows - PhysicsForums

[InsertName]

Hi, I'm not sure if this is the correct section of the forum to post this but here it goes...

I'm looking for some plotting software (to run on Windows) that would be suitable for general use on an undergraduate physics course. I've played with "Grapher" on OSX and it seemed like the kind of thing I'm looking for, except it's on OSX. I've had a little search of the PhysicsForums site and I couldn't find anything relevant (there are a lot of nice Java based simulations though!).

The most important thing is the ability to plot 2D functions. E.g. I just type y=2cosh(x/2) and it plots it. If it accepts more general algebraic (rather than numerical) things like y=acosh(bx), where a and b are constants, that would be awesome.

The more features it has (while remaining a GUI) the better. For example, plotting a vector field.

It would be great if it was free but I would pay for good software.

Thanks for any help.

 

[flatmaster]

Mathematica

 

[ZapperZ]

I use Origin.

Zz.

 

[a-tom-ic]

Next to the ones already suggested you might try these (all free of charge):

• http://www.microsoft.com/education/products/student/math/default.aspx#Overview"
• http://www.speqmath.com/index.php?id=1"
• https://sites.google.com/site/guioctave/screenshots" (Octave with an interface similar to Matlab)

Something like SciPy would not fall under your GUI category, would it?

 

[DaleSwanson]

I use http://www.gnuplot.info/" for plotting data. When I just want a quick graphing calculator I use this website:
http://my.hrw.com/math06_07/nsmedia/tools/Graph_Calculator/graphCalc.html

 

[InsertName]

Thanks for the replies!