MATLAB Function Reference

Lineseries Properties

You can set and query graphics object properties using the set and get commands or with the property editor (propertyeditor).

See Plot Objects for more information on lineseries objects.

Note that you cannot define default properties for lineseries objects.

Lineseries Property Descriptions

This section lists property names along with the type of values each accepts. Curly braces { } enclose default values.

This object is being deleted. The BeingDeleted property provides a mechanism that you can use to determine if objects are in the process of being deleted. MATLAB sets the BeingDeleted property to on when the object's delete function callback is called (see the DeleteFcn property). It remains set to on while the delete function executes, after which the object no longer exists.

For example, an object's delete function might call other functions that act on a number of different objects. These functions may not need to perform actions on objects that are going to be deleted and, therefore, can check the object's BeingDeleted property before acting.

Callback routine interruption. The BusyAction property enables you to control how MATLAB handles events that potentially interrupt executing callback routines. If there is a callback routine executing, callback routines invoked subsequently always attempt to interrupt it. If the Interruptible property of the object whose callback is executing is set to on (the default), then interruption occurs at the next point where the event queue is processed. If the Interruptible property is off, the BusyAction property (of the object owning the executing callback) determines how MATLAB handles the event. The choices are

• cancel -- Discard the event that attempted to execute a second callback routine.
• queue -- Queue the event that attempted to execute a second callback routine until the current callback finishes.

Button press callback function. A callback function that executes whenever you press a mouse button while the pointer is over the line object. Define this routine as a string that is a valid MATLAB expression or the name of an M-file. The expression executes in the MATLAB workspace.

See Function Handle Callbacks for information on how to use function handles to define the callback function.

The empty matrix; line objects have no children.

Clipping mode. MATLAB clips lines to the axes plot box by default. If you set Clipping to off, lines are displayed outside the axes plot box. This can occur if you create a line, set hold to on, freeze axis scaling (axis manual), and then create a longer line.

Line color. A three-element RGB vector or one of the MATLAB predefined names, specifying the line color. See the ColorSpec reference page for more information on specifying color.

Callback routine executed during object creation. This property defines a callback that executes when MATLAB creates a lineseries object. You must specify the callback during the creation of the object. For example,

• plot(1:10,'CreateFcn',@CallbackFcn)
  

where @CallbackFcn is a function handle that references the callback function.

MATLAB executes this routine after setting all other lineseries properties. Setting this property on an existing lineseries object has no effect.

The handle of the object whose CreateFcn is being executed is accessible only through the root CallbackObject property, which you can query using gcbo.

See Function Handle Callbacks for information on how to use function handles to define the callback function.

Delete line callback routine. A callback routine that executes when you delete the line object (e.g., when you issue a delete command or clear the axes or figure). MATLAB executes the routine before deleting the object's properties so these values are available to the callback routine.

The handle of the object whose DeleteFcn is being executed is accessible only through the root CallbackObject property, which you can query using gcbo.

See Function Handle Callbacks for information on how to use function handles to define the callback function.

Label used by plot legends. The legend command and the figure's active legend use the text you specify for this property as labels for any bar objects appearing in these legends.

Erase mode. This property controls the technique MATLAB uses to draw and erase line objects. Alternative erase modes are useful for creating animated sequences, where control of the way individual objects are redrawn is necessary to improve performance and obtain the desired effect.

• normal (the default) -- Redraw the affected region of the display, performing the three-dimensional analysis necessary to ensure that all objects are rendered correctly. This mode produces the most accurate picture, but is the slowest. The other modes are faster, but do not perform a complete redraw and are therefore less accurate.
• none -- Do not erase the line when it is moved or destroyed. While the object is still visible on the screen after erasing with EraseMode none, you cannot print it because MATLAB stores no information about its former location.
• xor -- Draw and erase the line by performing an exclusive OR (XOR) with the color of the screen beneath it. This mode does not damage the color of the objects beneath the line. However, the line's color depends on the color of whatever is beneath it on the display.
• background -- Erase the line by drawing it in the axes background Color, or the figure background Color if the axes Color is set to none. This damages objects that are behind the erased line, but lines are always properly colored.

Printing with Nonnormal Erase Modes

MATLAB always prints figures as if the EraseMode of all objects is normal. This means graphics objects created with EraseMode set to none, xor, or background can look different on screen than on paper. On screen, MATLAB may mathematically combine layers of colors (e.g., performing an XOR on a pixel color with that of the pixel behind it) and ignore three-dimensional sorting to obtain greater rendering speed. However, these techniques are not applied to the printed output.

You can use the MATLAB getframe command or other screen capture application to create an image of a figure containing nonnormal mode objects.

Selectable by mouse click. HitTest determines if the line can become the current object (as returned by the gco command and the figure CurrentObject property) as a result of a mouse click on the line. If HitTest is off, clicking the line selects the object below it (which may be the axes containing it).

Control access to object's handle by command-line users and GUIs. This property determines when an object's handle is visible in its parent's list of children. HandleVisibility is useful for preventing command-line users from accidentally drawing into or deleting a figure that contains only user interface devices (such as a dialog box).

Handles are always visible when HandleVisibility is on.

Setting HandleVisibility to callback causes handles to be visible from within callback routines or functions invoked by callback routines, but not from within functions invoked from the command line. This provides a means to protect GUIs from command-line users, while allowing callback routines to have complete access to object handles.

Setting HandleVisibility to off makes handles invisible at all times. This might be necessary when a callback routine invokes a function that might potentially damage the GUI (such as evaluating a user-typed string), and so temporarily hides its own handles during the execution of that function.

When a handle is not visible in its parent's list of children, it cannot be returned by functions that obtain handles by searching the object hierarchy or querying handle properties. This includes get, findobj, gca, gcf, gco, newplot, cla, clf, and close.

When a handle's visibility is restricted using callback or off, the object's handle does not appear in its parent's Children property, figures do not appear in the root's CurrentFigure property, objects do not appear in the root's CallbackObject property or in the figure's CurrentObject property, and axes do not appear in their parent's CurrentAxes property.

You can set the root ShowHiddenHandles property to on to make all handles visible regardless of their HandleVisibility settings (this does not affect the values of the HandleVisibility properties).

Handles that are hidden are still valid. If you know an object's handle, you can set and get its properties, and pass it to any function that operates on handles.

Callback routine interruption mode. The Interruptible property controls whether a lineseries callback routine can be interrupted by subsequently invoked callback routines. Only callback routines defined for the ButtonDownFcn are affected by the Interruptible property. MATLAB checks for events that can interrupt a callback routine only when it encounters a drawnow, figure, getframe, or pause command in the routine.

Style of line drawn. This property specifies the style of the line used to draw the lineseries object. The following table shows available line styles.

Symbol	Line Style
-	Solid line (default)
--	Dashed line
:	Dotted line
-.	Dash-dot line
none	No line

You can use LineStyle none when you want to place a marker at each point but do not want the points connected with a line (see the Marker property).

The width of the lineseries object. Specify this value in points (1 point = ¹/₇₂ inch). The default LineWidth is 0.5 points.

Marker symbol. The Marker property specifies marks that are displayed at data points. You can set values for the Marker property independently from the LineStyle property. Supported markers are shown in the following table.

Marker Specifier	Description
+	Plus sign
o	Circle
*	Asterisk
.	Point
x	Cross
'square' or s	Square
'diamond' or d	Diamond
^	Upward-pointing triangle
v	Downward-pointing triangle
>	Right-pointing triangle
<	Left-pointing triangle
'pentagram' or p	Five-pointed star (pentagram)
'hexagram' or h	Six-pointed star (hexagram)
none	No marker (default)

Marker edge color. The color of the marker or the edge color for filled markers (circle, square, diamond, pentagram, hexagram, and the four triangles). ColorSpec defines the color to use. none specifies no color, which makes nonfilled markers invisible. auto sets MarkerEdgeColor to the same color as the Color property.

Marker face color. The fill color for markers that are closed shapes (circle, square, diamond, pentagram, hexagram, and the four triangles). ColorSpec defines the color to use. none makes the interior of the marker transparent, allowing the background to show through. auto sets the fill color to the axes color, or the figure color, if the axes Color property is set to none (which is the factory default for axes).

Marker size. A scalar specifying the size of the marker, in points. The default value for MarkerSize is six points (1 point = 1/72 inch). Note that MATLAB draws the point marker (specified by the '.' symbol) at one-third the specified size.

Parent of lineseries object. This property contains the handle of the lineseries object's parent. The parent of a lineseries object is the axes, hggroup, or hgtransform object that contains it.

See Objects That Can Contain Other Objects for more information on parenting graphics objects.

Is object selected? When this property is on, MATLAB displays selection handles if the SelectionHighlight property is also on. You can, for example, define the ButtonDownFcn callback to set this property, allowing users to select the object with the mouse.

Objects are highlighted when selected. When the Selected property is on, MATLAB indicates the selected state by drawing handles at each vertex. When SelectionHighlight is off, MATLAB does not draw the handles.

User-specified object label. The Tag property provides a means to identify graphics objects with a user-specified label. This is particularly useful when you are constructing interactive graphics programs that would otherwise need to define object handles as global variables or pass them as arguments between callback routines. You can define Tag as any string.

Class of graphics object. For lineseries objects, Type is always the string line.

Associate a context menu with the lineseries object. Assign this property the handle of a uicontextmenu object created in the same figure as the lineseries. Use the uicontextmenu function to create the context menu. MATLAB displays the context menu whenever you right-click over the lineseries object.

User-specified data. Any data you want to associate with the lineseries object. MATLAB does not use this data, but you can access it using the set and get commands.

Lineseries object visibility. By default, all lineseries objects are visible. When set to off, the object is not visible, but still exists, and you can get and set its properties.

X-coordinates. A vector of x-coordinates defining the lineseries object. YData and ZData must be the same size.

Use automatic or user-specified x-axis values. If you specify XData, MATLAB sets this property to manual.

If you set XDataMode to auto after having specified XData, MATLAB resets the x-axis ticks and x-tick labels to the indices of the YData, overwriting any previous values.

Link XData to MATLAB variable. Set this property to a MATLAB variable that, by default, is evaluated in the base workspace to generate the XData.

MATLAB reevaluates this property only when you set it. Therefore, a change to workspace variables appearing in an expression does not change XData.

You can use the refreshdata function to force an update of the object's data. refreshdata also enables you to specify that the data source variable be evaluated in the workspace of a function from which you call refreshdata.

See the refreshdata reference page for more information.

Note    If you change one data source property to a variable that contains data of a different dimension, you might cause the function to generate a warning and not render the graph until you have changed all data source properties to appropriate values.

Y-coordinates. A vector of y-coordinates defining the lineseries object. XData and ZData must be the same length and have the same number of rows.

Link YData to MATLAB variable. Set this property to a MATLAB variable that, by default, is evaluated in the base workspace to generate the YData.

MATLAB reevaluates this property only when you set it. Therefore, a change to workspace variables appearing in an expression does not change YData.

You can use the refreshdata function to force an update of the object's data. refreshdata also enables you to specify that the data source variable be evaluated in the workspace of a function from which you call refreshdata.

See the refreshdata reference page for more information.

Note    If you change one data source property to a variable that contains data of a different dimension, you might cause the function to generate a warning and not render the graph until you have changed all data source properties to appropriate values.

Z-coordinates. A vector of z-coordinates defining the lineseries object. XData and YData must be the same length and have the same number of rows.

Link ZData to MATLAB variable. Set this property to a MATLAB variable that, by default, is evaluated in the base workspace to generate the ZData.

MATLAB reevaluates this property only when you set it. Therefore, a change to workspace variables appearing in an expression does not change ZData.

You can use the refreshdata function to force an update of the object's data. refreshdata also enables you to specify that the data source variable be evaluated in the workspace of a function from which you call refreshdata.

See the refreshdata reference page for more information.

Note    If you change one data source property to a variable that contains data of a different dimension, you might cause the function to generate a warning and not render the graph until you have changed all data source properties to appropriate values.

Line Properties

LineSpec

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