                  Chapter 1:  Introduction

DISLIN is a library of subroutines  and functions  that dis-
play data  graphically.  The routines  can be used  with any 
display device capable of  drawing straight  lines  with the
exception of  routines  that  generate  3-D colour  graphics
which require special devices. Fortran and C versions of the
library are available.

DISLIN stores the graphic  information in a  device-indepen-
dent metafile that is converted  by a device  driver program
for plotting  on various devices.  Two formats can be selec-
ted: a GKSLIN metafile coded in ASCII and a CGM binary meta-
file corresponding to the ANSI norm.  Device-dependent plot-
files can  also be generated by  DISLIN  such as  PostScript
files, HPGL files, Prescribe files for Kyocera printers  and
Tektronix emulations for graphic terminals.

Chapter 2  describes the file and page formats and the over-
all structure of DISLIN programs.

Chapter 3 describes routines for the initialization,  termi-
nation and plotting of text, numbers and symbols.

Chapter 4  presents the  format of two-dimensional axis sys-
tems.  Axes can be  linearly or  logarithmically  scaled and
labeled with linear, logarithmic, time, map and user-defined
formats.

Chapter 5  describes the routines for plotting curves. Seve-
ral curves  can appear in one axis system  and can be diffe-
rentiated by colour, line style and pattern.

Chapter 6 summarizes  parameter setting  routines that over-
write default plotting parameters  such as fonts,  character
size and angle,  colours, line styles and patterns.

Chapter 7  presents routines  to request  the values of plot
parameters.

Chapter 8  describes  the routines for plotting lines, circ-
les, ellipses, vectors and shaded regions.

Chapter 9  describes  the utilities  available  to transform
coordinates,  sort data and calculate the lengths of numbers
and character strings.

Chapter 10  introduces  business graphic routines  to create
bar graphs and pie charts.

Chapter 11 presents  3-D colour graphics where points can be
plotted  with coloured  or shaded rectangles.  A colour gra-
phics  device  or a  PostScript printer  is needed for these
subroutines and functions.

Chapter 12  describes  routines for  3-D coordinate systems.
Axis systems, curves and surfaces can be drawn  from various
angular perspectives.  All 2-D plotting routines can be used
in a 3-D axis system.

Chapter 13  presents 14 different methods to project geogra-
phical coordinates onto  a plane surface.  Several base maps
are stored in the library for map plotting.

Chapter 14  describes routines for contouring three-dimensi-
onal functions of the form Z = F(X,Y).  Contours can be fil-
led with solid lines.

Chapter 15  offers routines for  creating graphical user in-
terfaces in Fortran and C programs.

Chapter 16 describes routines for plotting and modifying the
MPAe emblem. 

