Table Surface
Use a Table Surface () plot to visualize the data in a table that represents a matrix of values that are functions of two independent parameters (for example, as a response surface plot). See Creating a Surface Plot of Values as Functions of Two Parameters below. Right-click a 2D Plot Group to add this plot type from the More Plots submenu. This plot is also available by selecting Table Surface () from the Table window’s toolbar. If desired, right-click the Table Surface node to add Height Expression, Material Appearance, and Transparency (when a Height Expression has been added only) subnodes.
Go to Common Results Node Settings for links to information about these sections: Title, Range, Coloring and Style, and Inherit Style.
When created from the Table window toolbar, the 2D plot group with the Table Surface plot uses None in the Dataset selection. When you add a Table Surface plot to an existing or new 2D plot group, the dataset is typically a solution dataset, and the plot group includes a plot of the dataset edges. This can make the table surface plot hard to see because it uses parameter values on the x- and y-axis and not the 2D geometry’s dimension.
Creating a Surface Plot of Values as Functions of Two Parameters
Follow these steps to create a surface plot of values of some quantity as a function of two parameters, where you vary two parameters in a parametric sweep while keeping the other parameters fixed:
1
In the Study branch, add a Parametric Sweep () node.
2
In the Settings window for Parametric Sweep, add the parameters that you want to sweep to the parameter list.
3
Select All combinations from the Sweep type list to get a full parametric sweep of all parameter values.
4
Solve the model.
5
Add a Point Evaluation () node under Derived Values, select a point where you want to evaluate the solution data, and click Evaluate. A table is created.
6
In the Table window, click the Table Surface () button.
7
In the 2D Plot Group, select the Table Surface node. In its Settings window you can select which parameter to plot on the x-axis and on the y-axis, and which values you want to select as fixed for the other parameters.
Data
From the Source list, choose Table or Evaluation group, and then choose a table or evaluation group table with the data that you want to plot as a surface plot from the Table or Evaluation group list below.
From the Data format list, select one of the following formats for interpreting the table data:
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Select Filled table if the data is structurally filled (for tables only; this option is not available for evaluation groups). See Filled Table for additional settings for this data format.
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Select Columns (the default) if you want to specify what columns to take the data from. See Columns for additional settings for this format.
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Select Cells to treat the tables data as cells in a matrix and use the table row and column numbers as the x- and y-coordinates, respectively. There are no additional settings for this format.
Filled Table
Select an option from the Plot data list: From table (the default) or Manual. If Manual is selected, select options from the x-axis data and y-axis data lists, which contain the parameters that define the rows and columns for the table’s matrix data, and from the Data list, which corresponds to the Data list in the Table node for the matrix data. If there are additional parameters in a parametric sweep, they need to be kept at fixed values, which you select from the Parameter value list, which contains all combinations of parameter values for the parameters that are not used as x-axis or y-axis data.
Columns
From the x-axis column, y-axis column, and Data column lists, choose the columns to use for the x-axis, y-axis, and the data, respectively.
For all data formats, select the Plot imaginary part check box if you want to plot the imaginary part of complex-valued data. For real-valued data, that plot shows a zero imaginary part.
Preprocessing
This section contains settings to preprocess the data in the table surface plot by scaling and shifting the data values, which can be useful to match data from different sources or to scale some data to express the values in another unit.
Under x-axis column, y-axis column, and Data column, from the Preprocessing list select:
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None (the default), for no preprocessing of the data.
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Linear, to preprocess the data using a linear transformation of the data values for the x- or y-axis column or the data column. You define the linear preprocessing with values for the scaling (default: 1) and the shift or offset (default: 0) in the Scaling and Shift fields, respectively. The default values do not change the original data values.