Output scaled distance in Measure Distances (ref: error bars)

[wcwetzel]

Hi, I love the software. Thanks for all your hard work. It would be helpful if the Measure Distances feature could output scaled distances instead of pixel distances. It's possible to do the conversion manually, but it takes time.

Thanks, Will

[ankitrohatgi]

Hello Will,

If you select the axes type as "Map", then the distances are properly scaled. Did you mean to add scaling for XY plots as well? I didn't do that part as X and Y could be in different units and a distance defined as Sqrt((x1 - x2)^2 + (y1-y2)^2)) doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Still, if you think it is useful, then it can be added.

[wcwetzel]

Hi Ankit,

Thanks for the quick reply! I'd like to digitize points and error bars associated with each point for figures in 100+ papers. The error bars are parallel to the y-axis (vertical error bars), so distance would just be in units of the y-axis. Maybe it would make most sense to add a specific error bar measuring tool that measures distance just along the y-axis in units of the y-axis. It would be really cool if it could be integrated with the point digitizing tool, so that the output csv has 3 columns: (1) x-value of point, (2) y-value of point, and (3) length of error bar. This feature would be hugely, hugely helpful. But just having distance displayed in scaled units would be great too.

Thanks a ton, Will

[ankitrohatgi]

Hi Will,

I have wanted to do something about the error bars, but I couldn't come up with an elegant solution. You have suggested an interesting way to do this. I will think about this and try to get it in with the next round of changes I make.

Thanks, Ankit

[wcwetzel]

Great! Thanks.

Best, Will