[R] Displaying a distribution -- was: Combining two histograms

[Gabor Grothendieck]

Berton Gunter <gunter.berton <at> gene.com> writes:

: 
: May I take this off topic a little to seek collective wisdom (and so feel
: free to reply privately).
: 
: The catalyst is Deepayan's remark:
: 
: > Histograms were appropriate for drawing density estimates by 
: > hand in the  good old days, but I can imagine very few situations where I 
: > would not prefer to use smoother density estimates when I have the 
: > computational power to do so.
: > 
: > Deepayan
: 
: Generally, I agree; but the appearance and thus one's perception and
: interpretation of both histograms and density plots depend upon the
: parameters chosen for the display (bin boundaries for histograms; bandwidth
: and kernel for density plots). 

If the problem is distrust of the procedure one can simulataneously
display the raw data with a rug plot, 

example(rug)