XFIG Users Manual

Getting and Installing Xfig

Installing TransFig

Related Software

Related Applications


Getting and Installing Xfig

This is the installation procedure of xfig. See the README file for more details. For information about how to use Japanese support facility, see also Japanese Support (or Internationalization).

  1. Get the source of xfig(xfig.3.2.3-beta-1.tar.gz) and gunzip and untar the file:
    Either do:
    1. gunzip -c xfig.3.2.3-beta-1.tar.gz | tar xvf -
      or
    2. gunzip xfig.3.2.3-beta-1.tar.gz
      tar xvf xfig.3.2.3-beta-1.tar

    You can get the source from   ftp://www-epb.lbl.gov/xfig,   http://www.xfig.org/xfigdist,   ftp://ftp.x.org/contrib/applications/drawing_tools/xfig and its mirror sites   or from any CTAN machine ( ftp://ftp.tex.ac.uk/pub/archive/graphics, for example).

  2. You also need ghostscript which can be found at ftp://prep.ai.mit.edu/pub/gnu and its mirror sites, or at ftp.cs.wisc.edu/ghost/aladdin.
    It must be compiled with the pbmraw, ppmraw, pcx256, jpeg, and tiff24nc drivers.

  3. Edit the Imakefile if you need to customize it:
    Check the README file for more information about specific systems.

  4. Type xmkmf to generate a Makefile for your system.

  5. Type make to compile xfig.

  6. After the compilation has finished, type make install to copy the files to the appropriate directories.

    If you don't use make install and copy files manually, note that:

  7. Type make install.man to copy the manual pages to the appropriate directory.

Installing TransFig/fig2dev

Here is the installation procedure for TransFig (fig2dev). See README file in for details.

  1. Get the source of TransFig (transfig.3.2.2.tar.gz), and untar the file. It should be available at the same site as xfig.

  2. You shouldn't need to change the toplevel Imakefile or the Imakefile in fig2dev/dev.
    Edit fig2dev/Imakefile if you need to customize it:

    See README and Imakefile for more details.

  3. Type xmkmf to generate the Makefile.

  4. Type make Makefiles to generate the Makefiles. Note the ``s'' in ``Makefiles''.

  5. Type make to compile TransFig and fig2dev.

  6. Type make install to copy the executable and files to the appropriate directories.

  7. Type make install.man to copy the manual pages to the appropriate directory.

Related Software

The following lists mention packages which are useful for xfig. The first is a list of libraries which improve the look of xfig and allow import/export of XPM and JPEG images. The second is a list of programs that may be useful in conjunction with xfig. The first item in that list (TransFig) is mandatory for exporting files from xfig.

Libraries

Xaw3d (Three-D Athena Widget) library
If Xaw3d is used instead of normal Xaw, widgets such as buttons will have 3-D appearance. It is available from ftp://ftp.x.org/contrib/widgets and its mirror sites in /contrib/widgets.
XPM3 package
This package provides facilities to handle images in XPM format. It is available from ftp://ftp.x.org/contrib/libraries and its mirror sites in /contrib/libraries.
JPEG library
This package provides facilities to handle images in JPEG format. The official distribution site is ftp://ftp.uu.net/graphics/jpeg. It is also available from ftp://ftp.x.org/contrib/libraries and its mirror sites in /contrib/libraries.

Related Applications

Here is a list of related applications. See also Scientific Applications on Linux (SAL) for more applications for Linux (many of them may also work on another UNIX-compatible platforms).
fig2dev (TransFig)
fig2dev provides the facility to convert figures created with xfig into various formats. You must have fig2dev because xfig invokes it when Exporting or Printing. fig2dev is part of the TransFig package.
GhostScript
xfig will invoke GhostScript (the gs command) when displaying an imported PostScript image. GhostScript is a product of the Free Software Foundation (Aladdin Enterprises owns the copyright), and it is available from ftp://prep.ai.mit.edu/pub/gnu and its mirror sites, or ftp.cs.wisc.edu/ghost/aladdin.
cdraw2fig
Converts `Cheap Draw' format to Fig format. Cheap Draw 2.0 was written by Bob Pratt and is available from the UNIXPC archives at osu-cis. GIMP
A comprehensive image manipulation program, GIMP (Gnu Image Manipulation Program) is freely available from http://www.gimp.org/.
gnuplot
gnuplot is a plotting package which can output in Fig and other formats. The official distribution site is ftp://ftp.dartmouth.edu/pub/gnuplot, but you can also get it from the comp.sources.misc archive newsgroup.
gzip (gunzip)
xfig will invoke gunzip when reading gzipped files. gzip (gunzip) is a product of the Free Software Foundation, and is available from ftp://prep.ai.mit.edu and its mirror sites.
hp2xx
hp2xx can convert HP-GL files into other formats such as PostScript, LaTeX or Fig. It is available from ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/hp2xx.
chemtool
A chemical structure editor for X11 available from http://www.uni-ulm.de/~s_tvolk/chemtool that writes Fig output (and relies on transfig for anything more fancy than xbm)
mifXfig
mifXfig will convert files between MIF format (of Framemaker(TM)) and Fig format. See http://www.ida.liu.se/~vaden/teaching/m2f/ for details.
Msphinx
a friendly package to handle satellite images.
    Main features:
      Msphinx includes two types of analysis and processing functions:
         - Functions to process the basic data geometry and
                      projection planes.
         - Functions to manipulate and modify the graphic display and print.

     Communication capabilities:
         - Data writes from external user programs
              (C or Fortran) into the memory planes.
         - User-to-user data exchange (text or images).
         - User image data base visualisation.
         - Direct links to other packages:
            - Mgraph (2d and contouring plotting)
            - HDFLook (HDF read write files)
            - Xfig (Facility for Interactive Generation of figures)
            - mpeg_encode (mpeg format nimations)

Find it at:  http://loasys.univ-lille1.fr/Msphinx/Msphinx_gb.html
netpbm
fig2dev will invoke the appropriate command from the netpbm package when exporting figures to bitmap formats. netpbm is available from ftp://ftp.x.org/contrib/applications/drawing_tools/xfig and its mirror sites or from ftp://ftp.cdrom.com/pub/X11/contrib/utilities.
figbuild
figbuild reads xfig files (Version 3.x, tested with 3.1, 3.2) plus its own config file for heights, and generates a Radiance input file. Written by Peter Apian-Bennewitz at Fraunhofer ISE, Germany. See: http://www.ise.fhg.de/radiance/pabs-toolbox/figbuild/figbuild.html
pic2fig
Convertes PIC format (used with troff, ditroff, etc) to Fig format. It is available from ftp://ftp.cs.orst.edu/localsrc/graphics or ftp://ftp.x.org/contrib/utilities and its mirror sites in /contrib/utilities.
plot2fig
Converts UNIX plot format to Fig format. Available from any GNU site.
plotutils (GNU)
includes an application for XY plotting (graph), a plot filter (plot), a Tektronix translator (tek2plot), a program for displaying font character maps (plotfont), and a library for drawing 2-D vector graphics (libplot), all of which produce output in xfig format. by Robert S. Maier <rsm@math.arizona.edu>. See: http://www.gnu.org/software/plotutils/plotutils.html
pstoedit
pstoedit can convert PostScript files into Fig format. It is available from ftp://ftp.x.org/contrib/applications/tgif/pstoedit and its mirror sites in /contrib/applications/tgif/pstoedit.
xfigbar and xfigpie
Two C programs to produce bar and pie charts as Fig files. Written by John Conover <john@johncon.johncon.com>, these programs are available by sending email thus:
mail info-request@johncon.com
Subject: archive
get xfigutilities.shar
xgraph
xgraph is a plotting package which runs in X11. The version on ftp://iworks.ecn.uiowa.edu in comp.hp can output Fig files.
xpaint
xpaint is a painting program which runs under X11. It is available from http://www.danbbs.dk/~torsten/xpaint and any SunSite machines such as ftp://sunsite.unc.edu/pub/Linux/apps/graphics/draw/.
xv
xv can be used to display images in various formats and allows some editing of those images (cropping, color editing scaling/rotating etc). By default, xfig will invoke xv when the Edit Image button is pressed in the edit PICTURE object panel. xv is shareware and is available via anonymous ftp from ftp://ftp.cis.upenn.edu/pub/xv.

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