strange performances of R graphic window under Linux and MS WIndows

2009/1/22 Enrico Guastaldi <enrico.guastaldi at gmail.com>:

Moreover, the graphic result is very poor, if I compare the resolution of
two graphic windows (see attached file, Linux ont he left, and Windows on
the right: the latter is really much better!!!)

What I'm doing wrong? Or, what is wrong in X configuration of our Linux
computers?
Remeber that R in MS Windows under virtual machine is 10 times faster!

Cairo?!

 Your attachments have been stripped (or you forgot to attach them),
but latest R versions use the Cairo graphics 'engine', which produces
higher quality output at a speed cost. You can fire up a non-Cairo
device with X11(type="Xlib").
 The difference in speed is a factor 5 on my machine:

 > X11(type="Xlib")
 > system.time(pairs(USJudgeRatings))
   user  system elapsed
  0.176   0.004   0.407
 > system.time(pairs(USJudgeRatings))
   user  system elapsed
  0.836   0.252   2.398

 Cairo graphics can look a bit 'blurred' because of the anti-aliasing.

Barry

Dear list members,
I'm Kubuntu 8.10 + KDE4.1 user, but in other "older" kubuntu (8.04 + KDE3.5)
machine it happens the same strange think.
The performance of R graphic window under Linux are very poor compared with
MS WIndows, even if MS Windows is working under a Virtual machine: R under
Linux is more time consuming in performing a graphic plot.
In terms of time, R under Linux needs almost 10 seconds in order to
construct the attached graph, the result of this code:

pairs(USJudgeRatings)

while R under MS Windows requires less than 1 second!

Moreover, the graphic result is very poor, if I compare the resolution of
two graphic windows (see attached file, Linux ont he left, and Windows on
the right: the latter is really much better!!!)

What I'm doing wrong? Or, what is wrong in X configuration of our Linux
computers?

Probably wrongly configured. Note that the timing for x11(type="Xlib") is 
comparable with Windows, see capabilities() to see if you have "cairo" 
built. If it is built, it will be used, because it gives graphics output 
what is (more) device independent (looks the same on different devices), 
but may take longer. If I remember correctly, it also needs some pango 
packages, and things like font placings may depend on that.

This question is more appropriate for R-help.

Roger

PS. your attached figures did not get through - R mailing list sites have 
an explicit policy on attachments, set out in the posting guide at:

http://www.r-project.org/mail.html#instructions

http://www.r-project.org/posting-guide.html

Your HTML-formatted version was discarded - see the instructions to see 
how to make your mail client only send plain text. If you had attached a 
PNG graphics file, it would (probably) have got through.

Remeber that R in MS Windows under virtual machine is 10 times faster!

Any suggetions?

Thanks,

Roger Bivand
Economic Geography Section, Department of Economics, Norwegian School of
Economics and Business Administration, Helleveien 30, N-5045 Bergen,
Norway. voice: +47 55 95 93 55; fax +47 55 95 95 43
e-mail: Roger.Bivand at nhh.no

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