Alternative graphics packages

Before we start, let’s quickly look at where we come from and what else is out there.

The LaTeX picture environment

LaTeX itself defines some basic graphics commands. We can use a picture environment for this.

To get an idea of how it works, let’s have a quick look at a minimal example:

\setlength{\unitlength}{1cm}
\begin{picture}(1,1)
  \put(0,0){\circle{1}}
  \put(-0.5,0){\line(1,0){1}}
  \put(-0.3,0.06){text}
\end{picture}

The output is the following:

Figure 1.1 – A classic LaTeX picture drawing

Here, we did the following:

1. We set a base length. All numbers in drawing commands are seen as multiples of this base unit length.
2. We used \put(x,y){…} to put something at the Cartesian coordinate position x, y.
3. We wrote \circle{x} to get a circle with a diameter of x times the unit length.
4. We used \line(x,y){z} to get a line in vector direction...