\Header{plot}{Generic X-Y Plotting}
\keyword{hplot}{plot}
\begin{Description}\relax
Generic function for plotting of \R{} objects.  For more details about
the graphical parameter arguments, see \code{\Link{par}}.\end{Description}
\begin{Usage}
\begin{verbatim}
plot(x, y, xlim=range(x), ylim=range(y), type="p",
     main, xlab, ylab, ...)
\end{verbatim}
\end{Usage}
\begin{Arguments}
\begin{ldescription}
\item[\code{x}] the coordinates of points in the plot. Alternatively, a
single plotting structure, function or \emph{any \R{} object with a
\code{plot} method} can be provided.
\item[\code{y}] the y coordinates of points in the plot, \emph{optional}
if \code{x} is an appropriate structure.
\item[\code{xlim, ylim}] the ranges to be encompassed by the x and y axes.
\item[\code{type}] what type of plot should be drawn.  Possible types are
\Itemize{
\item \code{"p"} for \bold{p}oints,
\item \code{"l"} for \bold{l}ines,
\item \code{"b"} for \bold{b}oth,
\item \code{"c"} for the lines part alone of \code{"b"},
\item \code{"o"} for both ``\bold{o}verplotted'',
\item \code{"h"} for ``\bold{h}istogram'' like (or
``high-density'') vertical lines,
\item \code{"s"} for stair \bold{s}teps,
\item \code{"S"} for other \bold{s}teps, see \emph{Details} below,
\item \code{"n"} for no plotting.
}
All other \code{type}s give a warning or an error; using, e.g.,
\code{type = "punkte"} being equivalent to \code{type = "p"} for S
compatibility.

\item[\code{main}] an overall title for the plot.
\item[\code{xlab}] a title for the x axis.
\item[\code{ylab}] a title for the y axis.
\item[\code{...}] graphical parameters can be given as arguments to
\code{plot}.
\end{ldescription}
\end{Arguments}
\begin{Details}\relax
For simple scatter plots, \code{\Link{plot.default}} will be used.
However, there are \code{plot} methods for many \R{} objects,
including \code{\Link{function}}s, \code{\Link{data.frame}}s,
\code{\Link{density}} objects, etc.  Use \code{methods(plot)} and
the documentation for these.

The two step types differ in their x-y preference: Going from
\eqn{(x1,y1)}{} to \eqn{(x2,y2)}{} with \eqn{x1 < x2}{}, \code{type = "s"}
moves first horizontal, then vertical, whereas \code{type = "S"} moves
the other way around.\end{Details}
\begin{SeeAlso}\relax
\code{\Link{plot.default}}, \code{\Link{plot.formula}} and other
methods; \code{\Link{points}}, \code{\Link{lines}}, \code{\Link{par}}.\end{SeeAlso}
\begin{Examples}
\begin{ExampleCode}
data(cars)
plot(cars)
lines(lowess(cars))

plot(sin, -pi, 2*pi)

## Discrete Distribution Plot:
plot(table(rpois(100,5)), type = "h", col = "red", lwd=10,
     main="rpois(100,lambda=5)")

## Simple quantiles/ECDF, see ecdf() {library(stepfun)} for a better one:
plot(x <- sort(rnorm(47)), type = "s", main = "plot(x, type = \"s\")")
points(x, cex = .5, col = "dark red")
\end{ExampleCode}
\end{Examples}

