Software Recommendations for LaTeX Diagrams on Linux Ubuntu

[kbaumen]

I'm sorry if this is the wrong forum but I think that mathematicians often work with LaTex and should be able to answer.

Could you please recommend me any kind of software for creating diagrams (plotting functions, drawing vectors, writing down matrices, etc) and then converting these diagrams into LaTex code. Btw, I work with Linux Ubuntu and I won't use Wine, so, please, only software for Linux.

 

[rochfor1]

Learn LaTeX.

 

[matt grime]

LaTeX itself typesets most mathematical objects you need. It is not a great graphical tool, but see the LaTeX Graphics companion for more.

If you want to draw graphs, then look at R (which is entirely free in all senses), xv or xfig, and create graphics in eps format for inclusion into a LaTeX document (other formats work too). Other options (which aren't necessarily free) are maple, mathematica or matlab.

 

[kbaumen]

LaTeX itself typesets most mathematical objects you need. It is not a great graphical tool, but see the LaTeX Graphics companion for more.

If you want to draw graphs, then look at R (which is entirely free in all senses), xv or xfig, and create graphics in eps format for inclusion into a LaTeX document (other formats work too). Other options (which aren't necessarily free) are maple, mathematica or matlab.

Thank you!

 

[statdad]

You can also try the free software Sage - it is a nice little front end to some math packages, but it has a "sagetex" style for use with latex that allows sage code to be embedded inside
latex files.
there is a similar feature with R.

if you need "one off" graphics - diagrams, etc,, both the PS-Tricks (post-script tricks) packages and the pdg/tikz packages for latex are highly recommended. I found tikz easier to learn, but PS-Tricks can do many things tikz can't.

 

[isabelle]

I find that plots in PDF or postscript are best for LaTeX, and a simple free tool for generating professional quality plots of this kind is gnuplot.

 

[statdad]

If you intend to learn latex, even if you already know it, you can find (almost) no end of
very good advice on the web.

A good starting point is

www.tug.org

(tug = Tex Users' Group)

 

[qntty]

asymtote is what I use to draw graphs, geometric diagrams, etc.

 

[kbaumen]

Wow, thank you guys for all the advice.

 

[Santa1]

Asymptote! You can also use the "inhouse" graphics environment in your basic TeX package.

 

[kbaumen]

So I installed Tex Live and am now using just Gedit to write .tex files which I can than turn into neat .pdf documents. Of course I just started reading a manual on LaTeX and still don't know much about it but I'm quite amazed by the possibilities that are offered by LaTeX. Ok, got to go, read the manual.

Thank you all for the advice to learn LaTeX.