kst(1)

💖 kst(1) — the kst2 manual, but make it make sense 💖

okay bestie, so this is the manual page for kst(1) (it ships with kst2, iykyk) and honestly? it's giving "science but make it cute". plots, live data, the whole thing. let's get into it 🧚✨

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✨ NAME ✨

kst — she plots scientific data. that's it. that's the vibe. 📊💅

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✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

three whole moods, bestie. pick your fighter:

kst

kst    [ -F DATASOURCE ] [ -f STARTFRAME ] [ -n NUMFRAMES ] [ -s
       FRAMESPERSAMPLE [ -a ] ] kstfile

kst    datasource [ -f STARTFRAME ] [ -n NUMFRAMES ] [ -s
       FRAMESPERSAMPLE [ -a ] ] [ -P PLOTNAME ] [ -A] [ -d ] [ -l ] [ -b
       ] [ -x FIELD ] [ -e FIELD ] [ -r RATE ] [ -y FIELD ] [ -p FIELD ]
       [ -h FIELD ] [ -z FIELD ] [ --png filename ] [ --print filename [
       --landscape | --portrait ] [ --Letter | --A4 ] ]

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✨ DESCRIPTION ✨

so kst is a graphical data plotting tool, and the iconic part? it can plot live data — meaning it continuously updates the plot as new data becomes available. literally real-time plotting, no cap 🔥

you can run kst entirely from within its GUI, and in that case you need zero command line arguments. none. she's self-sufficient. and she's got a powerful wizard for easily setting up new plots — yes, a wizard, and yes, it's as magical as it sounds 🧙‍♀️✨

invocation #2: kst loads pre-saved plot specifications from the file kstfile, and optionally may override some of the settings in that file. lowkey the glow-up option 💅

invocation #3: kst displays plots of the data as directed in the default manner. you can also specify additional datasources on the command line, with options for that datasource following it. and here's the key detail, bestie: command line options generally apply to all subsequent options unless later overridden — so order matters, okay? 👑

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✨ OPTIONS ✨

• -A — plot all curves in separate plots. every curve gets her own moment, main character energy each 🎀
• -a — average frames (simple mean) when plotting with -s. the math-y one 🧮
• --A4 — use A4 sized paper for printing. Requires --print.
• -b — plot as bargraphs. bars! 📊
• -d — use points when plotting curves. dots only, no lines ✨
• -e FIELD — use FIELD as the magnitude of error bars applied to the next plot. (next plot specifically, okay? she's picky) 🙈
• -F datasource — override the datasource indicated in the kstfile and instead use datasource. swap her out 💫
• -f STARTFRAME — begin plotting at STARTFRAME frames into the data. set to -1 to start at NUMFRAMES from the end of the data. (yes, -1 is the secret reverse code 🔄)
• -h FIELD — plot FIELD as a histogram. distribution queen 👑
• -l — use lines when plotting curves. lines 4 lyfe 〰️
• --landscape — use landscape orientation for printing. Requires --print.
• --Letter — use US Letter sized paper for printing. Requires --print.
• -n NUMFRAMES — plot at most NUMFRAMES frames of data. set to -1 to indicate all of the data. (-1 = give me everything, no cap 💀)
• -P PLOTNAME — plot all plots in the plot named PLOTNAME. plotception 🌀
• -p FIELD — plot FIELD as a power spectrum plot. fancy physics moment 🌈
• --png filename — render to a portable network graphics (png) image with file name filename and quit. screenshot and dip 📸
• --portrait — use portrait orientation for printing. Requires --print.
• --print filename — print the plot to file filename and quit. printer arc 🖨️
• -s FRAMESPERSAMPLE — plot every FRAMESPERSAMPLE frames when plotting. sample it, don't scull it 🍓
• -x FIELD — use FIELD as the X-axis vector. horizontal icon ⭐
• -y FIELD — plot FIELD as an XY plot. the classic 💜
• -z FIELD — plot FIELD as an image. picture mode 🖼️

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✨ EXAMPLES ✨ (this is the fun part, fr fr)

Plot all data in column 2 from data.dat.

kst data.dat -y 2

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Same as above, except only read 20 lines, starting at line 10.

kst data.dat -f 10 -n 20 -y 2

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also read col 1. One plot per curve.

kst data.dat -f 10 -n 20 -y 1 -y 2

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Read col 1 from data2.dat and col 1 from data.dat

kst data.dat -f 10 -n 20 -y 2 data2.dat -y 1

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Same as above, except read 40 lines starting at 30 in data2.dat

kst data.dat -f 10 -n 20 -y 2 data2.dat -f 30 -n 40 -y 1

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Specify the X vector and error bars: Plot x = col 1 and Y = col 2 and error flags = col 3 from data.dat

kst data.dat -x 1 -e 3 -y 2

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Get the X vector from data1.dat, and the Y vector from data2.dat.

kst data1.dat -x 1 data2.dat -y 1

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Placement: Plot column 2 and column 3 in plot P1 and column 4 in plot P2

kst data.dat -P P1 -y 2 -y 3 -P P2 -y 4

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✨ BUGS ✨

found a bug? 😭 please report it to either the kst mailing list at kst@kde.org or to the kde bugzilla under the kst product at http://bugs.kde.org/. and here's the cute part: if you can run kst, you can easily report bugs by selecting Bug Report Wizard from the Help menu. built-in bug reporting, we love a self-aware icon 🫶

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✨ AUTHOR ✨

Matthew Truch <matt@truch.net> — thanks king 👑

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✨ LICENSE ✨

Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with no Invariant Sections, with no Front-Cover Texts, and with no Back-Cover Texts. a copy of the license is included in the COPYING.DOC file as part of the kst distribution. 📜

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aaaand that's the whole page, bestie 🎀 Version 2.1, dated 22 February 2011, kst(1) — go forth and plot something iconic 💖🦋