Overview

The polygon plot can display arbitrary polylines and polygons. Rather than providing a specific statistical function, the polygon plot allows you to create your own customized graphics.

To create a polygon plot, you need to specify at least three variables. The coordinates of vertices of each polygon (or vertices of a piecewise-linear polyline) are specified with X and Y variables. The polygon is drawn in the order that the coordinates are specified. A third nominal variable specifies an identifier to which each coordinate belongs.

In some instances, an object is composed of sub-objects. For example, a continent is composed of countries, a country is composed of individual provinces or states, and some of those states are composed of disconnected landmasses (such as islands). The polygon plot supports this hierarchical structure by allowing multiple nominal variables that identify the continent, state, and island to which each coordinate pair belongs.

To create a polygon plot using the GUI

1. Open or create a data table.

   For details, see Creating a Data Table.

2. Make sure the data table window is the active window.
3. On the Graph menu, click Polygon Plot.

   IML Studio displays the Polygon Plot dialog box.

4. Select a numeric variable and click Set X.
5. Select a numeric variable and click Set Y.
6. Select a nominal variable and click Add ID.

   You can repeat this step to specify additional ID variables.

7. Click OK.

For a discussion of the BY Variables and BY Options tabs, see BY Group Processing: Using BY Group Processing.