Solved. I tried to create a minimal example, but my script is too
complicated to just cut out lines (too many dependencies). Instead of
it, I sketch
my idea. I do not say it is the nicest solution, but it works as I wanted.

The first five rows of my data-matrix:
> data_svd$u[1:5,]
                [,1]       [,2]       [,3]         [,4]        [,5]
[,6]         [,7]
25.12333 -0.05845695 0.01147999 0.01369034 -0.014098243 -0.01332110
-0.03411848 -0.069044764
25.14667 -0.06067676 0.01207400 0.01567369 -0.003540611 -0.01833136
-0.04716164 -0.037310769
25.17    -0.06218749 0.01247501 0.02173719  0.008295593 -0.02289422
-0.03785958 -0.005219312
25.19333 -0.06310108 0.01122596 0.02510501  0.015560052 -0.01741544
-0.03004161  0.008608083
25.21667 -0.06362390 0.01073240 0.02882440  0.021066152 -0.02108871
-0.02228662  0.012336997
....

The rowname is printed as first at the beginning of the line. Now, I define
the X-axis range:
> XTimeRange <- seq(from=as.numeric(rownames(data_svd$u)[1]),
to=as.numeric(rownames(data_svd$u)[nrow(data_svd$u)]),
length=nrow(data_svd$u))

and plot the empty plot:
> Components <- seq(1:4)     # first four columns from the data-matrix
> plot(c(XTimeRange[1], XTimeRange[length(XTimeRange)]),
c(min(data_svd$u[,Components]), max(data_svd$u[,Components])), type = "n",
main="Plot of the \"base\"", xlab = "time / ps", ylab = "a.u.")

the x-axis is created automatically and nicely :) Now, I plot the curves
into the plot with the same x-axis range:
> for (x in rev(Components)) points(data_svd$u[, x]~XTimeRange, col = x,
type = "l")

My problem was in understanding what has to be assigned to the x-axis and
when:
> plot(c(XTimeRange[1], XTimeRange[length(XTimeRange)]),....
> points(data_svd$u[, x]~XTimeRange,...

(Right now, I do not think it was so hard to create it, but anybody
interested in running the script I can support the script.)

Thank you very much for all hints

It was a tough night... and in the morning I loved R a bit more.
Zroutik

On Tue, Jul 15, 2008 at 12:18 AM, stephen sefick <ssefick@gmail.com> wrote:

> why don't you give us a snippett of your data and then we may be able to
> help (read the posting guide)
>
>
> On Mon, Jul 14, 2008 at 6:04 PM, Zroutik Zroutik <zroutik@gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> Nope, this assigns the 26th, 28th, 30th anf 32nd point of the total
>> nrow(matrix) number of points. This does not assign the points (or places of
>> the x-axis) with such a rowname.
>>
>> row number <-> row name
>> 1:nrow(matrix) <-> rowname(matrix[1]) .. rowname(matrix[nrow(matrix)])
>>
>>
>> I try to rephrase my question: how do you plot a curve into a plot when
>> the x-axis isn't the rownumbers, but each row is a real x-value (e.g.
>> 35.23)?
>>
>>
>> p.s. there is a mistake in my original (first) email. Instead "at=NULL"
>> should be "at=Labels" (otherwise there is an error message). Sorry for
>> confusion.
>>
>>
>> On Mon, Jul 14, 2008 at 5:53 PM, stephen sefick <ssefick@gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> try at=seq(from=26, to=32, by=2) in the axis statment
>>> hope this helps
>>>
>>> Stephen
>>>
>>> On Mon, Jul 14, 2008 at 11:21 AM, Zroutik Zroutik <zroutik@gmail.com>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Dear R-users,
>>>>
>>>> I'm tackling with a problem which causing me a head-ache for a long
>>>> time. I
>>>> would like to create a nice x-axis to my plots, but I do not know how to
>>>> implement the method.
>>>>
>>>> Imagine a matrix where you have rownames real numbers -- these rownames
>>>> should be written in the x-axis nicely. I could not find any way how.
>>>>
>>>> I'll describe what I'm doing now:
>>>> I have a matrix where each column is an independent curve (number of the
>>>> columns 3-4). The rownames are the x-axis, and the names are real
>>>> numbers
>>>> (converted to chars, of course). I find the max and the min among the
>>>> values
>>>> in the matrix (for the y-axis) and I'm creating an empty plot. x-axis is
>>>> c(0, nrow(matrix)). Now, I'm creating the x-axis labels
>>>>
>>>> Labels <- seq(1, nrow(matrix), by = 100)
>>>> axis(1, at = NULL, labels = rownames(matrix)[Labels])
>>>>
>>>> At this point I'd like to have instead of "24.12333    26.45667    28.79
>>>> 31.12333    33.45667" at the x-axis, an optimally placed ticks at let's
>>>> say
>>>> "26 28 30 32" -- this is what I cannot achieve.
>>>>
>>>> Afterwards I'm plotting the curves in different colours. I know that the
>>>> x-values are accessed by the number of their row and not rowname.
>>>>
>>>> Anybody could point me into some direction, please? Thank you upfront!
>>>>
>>>>        [[alternative HTML version deleted]]
>>>>
>>>> ______________________________________________
>>>> R-help@r-project.org mailing list
>>>> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help
>>>> PLEASE do read the posting guide
>>>> http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html
>>>> and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Let's not spend our time and resources thinking about things that are so
>>> little or so large that all they really do for us is puff us up and make us
>>> feel like gods. We are mammals, and have not exhausted the annoying little
>>> problems of being mammals.
>>>
>>> -K. Mullis
>>
>>
>>
>
>
> --
> Let's not spend our time and resources thinking about things that are so
> little or so large that all they really do for us is puff us up and make us
> feel like gods. We are mammals, and have not exhausted the annoying little
> problems of being mammals.
>
> -K. Mullis
>

	[[alternative HTML version deleted]]

