5.8 The Simple Vector Graphics Format and Library

A Simple Vector Graphics (SVG) data format and library has been implemented as part of the VISTA visualization to provide a back-end interface for two-dimensional graphics output. An SVG plot is a sequence of simple, classical plotting commands like move, draw, label (write a text at the current position), pen (change the current drawing color), etc. This sequence of drawing commands is created by applications (e.g. by the SVG-Output module of VISTA's visualization toolkit, Table 5.4.1) and can be written to a .svg file for persistent storage and for exchange between applications. The SVG command set is limited to a few very simple operations to provide a comprehensible interface. The ease of interpretation of SVG plots facilitates the implementation of converters to other graphics formats. There are several clients inside VISTA which produce or consume SVG plots.

xpif2d

uses the SVG-output module and the SVG widget to display the result of the visualization and stores the plot in .svg format.

VORONOI

uses the SVG library to produce plots of the current triangulation for debugging purposes. Several figures in this text have been created using this feature.

vcpgp

is a graphics preprocessor for the interconnect simulator VLSICAP [59]. vcpgp also uses the SVG library to produce .svg files.

xsvg

is a simple X Windows client which displays .svg files using the SVG widget. It is shown in Figure 3.6.

svg2xfig

is a converter which translates .svg files to Xfig drawings.

svg2ps

is a converter which translates .svg files to (encapsulated) Postscript figures.

Figures 3.6, 6.1, 6.2, 6.3, 6.6, 6.8, 6.22, 6.23, 6.25, 6.26, 6.27, 6.28, 6.34, 6.35, 6.36, 6.37, 6.39, and 6.40 have been created using the SVG library.