This help topic is for R version 2.9.0. For the current version of R, try https://stat.ethz.ch/R-manual/R-patched/library/grid/html/gpar.html
gpar {grid}R Documentation

Handling Grid Graphical Parameters

Description

gpar() should be used to create a set of graphical parameter settings. It returns an object of class "gpar". This is basically a list of name-value pairs.

get.gpar() can be used to query the current graphical parameter settings.

Usage

gpar(...)
get.gpar(names = NULL)

Arguments

...

Any number of named arguments.

names

A character vector of valid graphical parameter names.

Details

All grid viewports and (predefined) graphical objects have a slot called gp, which contains a "gpar" object. When a viewport is pushed onto the viewport stack and when a graphical object is drawn, the settings in the "gpar" object are enforced. In this way, the graphical output is modified by the gp settings until the graphical object has finished drawing, or until the viewport is popped off the viewport stack, or until some other viewport or graphical object is pushed or begins drawing.

Valid parameter names are:

col Colour for lines and borders.
fill Colour for filling rectangles, polygons, ...
alpha Alpha channel for transparency
lty Line type
lwd Line width
lex Multiplier applied to line width
lineend Line end style (round, butt, square)
linejoin Line join style (round, mitre, bevel)
linemitre Line mitre limit (number greater than 1)
fontsize The size of text (in points)
cex Multiplier applied to fontsize
fontfamily The font family
fontface The font face (bold, italic, ...)
lineheight The height of a line as a multiple of the size of text
font Font face (alias for fontface; for backward compatibility)

Colours can be specified in one of the forms returned by rgb, as a name (see colors) or as a positive integer index into the current palette (with zero or negative values being taken as transparent).

The alpha setting is combined with the alpha channel for individual colours by multiplying (with both alpha settings normalised to the range 0 to 1).

The size of text is fontsize*cex. The size of a line is fontsize*cex*lineheight.

The cex setting is cumulative; if a viewport is pushed with a cex of 0.5 then another viewport is pushed with a cex of 0.5, the effective cex is 0.25.

The alpha and lex settings are also cumulative.

Changes to the fontfamily may be ignored by some devices, but is supported by PostScript, PDF, X11, Windows, and Quartz. The fontfamily may be used to specify one of the Hershey Font families (e.g., HersheySerif) and this specification will be honoured on all devices.

The specification of fontface can be an integer or a string. If an integer, then it follows the R base graphics standard: 1 = plain, 2 = bold, 3 = italic, 4 = bold italic. If a string, then valid values are: "plain", "bold", "italic", "oblique", and "bold.italic". For the special case of the HersheySerif font family, "cyrillic", "cyrillic.oblique", and "EUC" are also available.

Specifying the value NULL for a parameter is the same as not specifying any value for that parameter, except for col and fill, where NULL indicates not to draw a border or not to fill an area (respectively).

All parameter values can be vectors of multiple values. (This will not always make sense – for example, viewports will only take notice of the first parameter value.)

The gamma parameter is defunct since R 2.7.0.

get.gpar() returns all current graphical parameter settings.

Value

An object of class "gpar".

Author(s)

Paul Murrell

See Also

Hershey.

Examples

gp <- get.gpar()
utils::str(gp)
## These *do* nothing but produce a "gpar" object:
gpar(col = "red")
gpar(col = "blue", lty = "solid", lwd = 3, fontsize = 16)
get.gpar(c("col", "lty"))
grid.newpage()
vp <- viewport(w = .8, h = .8, gp = gpar(col="blue"))
grid.draw(gTree(children=gList(rectGrob(gp = gpar(col="red")),
                     textGrob(paste("The rect is its own colour (red)",
                                    "but this text is the colour",
                                    "set by the gTree (green)",
                                    sep = "\n"))),
      gp = gpar(col="green"), vp = vp))
grid.text("This text is the colour set by the viewport (blue)",
          y = 1, just = c("center", "bottom"),
          gp = gpar(fontsize=20), vp = vp)
grid.newpage()
## example with multiple values for a parameter
pushViewport(viewport())
grid.points(1:10/11, 1:10/11, gp = gpar(col=1:10))
popViewport()

[Package grid version 2.9.0 ]