[rrd-developers] Re: Options I am looking at adding

[Alex van den Bogaerdt]

On Sat, Nov 23, 2002 at 08:56:56PM -0500, Gandt, Eric wrote:
> I'm looking to add the following to RRD Tool, I have already modified a stable version to include these option, but am now looking at adding them to the development version:
>  
> 1.  Ability to support dual independant axis, each with its own limits

This sounds nice.  I don't want to sound too negative here but
I would like to make a suggestion:

Why support *one* extra axis?  I think with a little more effort it
would be possible to specify any (reasonable) number of axis on the
left hand side and/or the right hand side.

One thing to carefully look at (even with your example graph) is
*where* and *why* to position the grid lines / values.  Maybe one
Y-axis needs to be leading and the rest of the values should be
positioned according to the grid lines (this differs from what you
propose).

> 2.  Ability to created filled in regions that can that can be used a indecators

Seems to me this is a bit redundant.  If necessary/desired it can already
be implemented using INF and AREA when combined with a suitable CDEF.
There's already a lot of options to rrdtool graph and next you know it
the program evolves in the gimp...

> 3.  A cleaner and more readable legend style

I think Tobi already is working on that.  Tobi?

> LINE2:mydistance#00FFFF:l:'distance traveled' , the addtion of the l, tell what axis to 

This would be an incompatible change.  Not a bad thing per se.


Another, related, suggestion:  Perhaps it isn't wise to introduce
yet another option.  It would be possible to introduce graph
elements in stead.  For instance:


    TITLE:"test 2"
    YAXIS:LEFT:speed:unit=dynamic:major=4:U:U:U:U
    YAXIS:RIGHT:distance:unit=k:major=6:minor=2:0:10000:15000:U

The syntax for this YAXIS could be:

   "YAXIS:" place ":" label ":" unit ":" major ":" minor ":" bounds

   place ::= "LEFT" | "RIGHT"
   unit ::= "dynamic" | { "k" | "M" | "G"   (and so on) }
   bounds ::= minlow ":" maxlow ":" minhi ":" maxhi
   minlow ::= "U" | number
   maxlow ::= "U" | number
   minhi  ::= "U" | number
   maxhi  ::= "U" | number

Several of these items could be optional.

The minor and major number indicates the number of grid lines that
are desired.  This is different from what RRDtool does currently.
When the rate isn't known, it is impossible to say "plot the lines
2K apart".  It is possible to say "show 6 minor grid lines and
separate them using 2 minor grid lines".

The scale would range from no less than "minlow" and no more than
"maxlow"  to  no less than "minhi" and no more than "maxhi".  Any
of these can be set to unknown meaning "don't care".


cheers,
Alex

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