[R] Double buffering plots on Windows

[Paul Murrell]

Hi

Take a look at dev.hold() and dev.flush()

Paul

On 23/03/24 06:43, Bickis, Mikelis wrote:
> Hello:
> 
> I want to present a sequence of plots as an animation. As a toy example 
> consider the code
> 
> function(n){for (i in 1:n){
> plot(1:100,sin(i*(1:100)),type="l")
> title(paste("n=",i))
> segments(0,0,100,0,col=2)
> }}
> 
> This sort-of works on a MacOS platform, but the rendering of the plots 
> is a bit choppy. Inserting a sleep function allows the plots to evolve 
> smoothly.
> 
> function(n){for (i in 1:n){
> plot(1:100,sin(i*(1:100)),type="l")
> title(paste("n=",i))
> segments(0,0,100,0,col=2)
> Sys.sleep(.2)
> }}
> 
> However, on a Windows platform, only the last plot is rendered without 
> the Sys.sleep, so the dynamic element is lost. Inserting the Sys.sleep 
> does allow all the plots to be rendered, but they seem to be erased 
> before they are drawn again, so there is substantial flicker in the 
> appearance.
> 
> Is there some kind of double-buffering available within R, so that plots 
> are rendered only after they are fully drawn, leaving the previous plot 
> visible until it is replaced? I just used the default graphics driver on 
> Windows — is there perhaps a different driver that will the graphics 
> smoother?
> 
> Mik Bickis
> Professor Emeritus
> Department of Mathematics and Statistics
> University of Saskatchewan
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-- 
Dr Paul Murrell (he/him)
Te Kura Tatauranga | Department of Statistics
Waipapa Taumata Rau | The University of Auckland
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