text — GMT 6.1.1 documentation

# text

Plot or typeset text

## Synopsis

gmt text [ textfiles ] -J parameters -R west/east/south/north[/zmin/zmax][+r][+uunit] [ -A ] -B[p|s]parameters [ -C[dx/dy][+to|O|c|C] ] [ -D[j|J]dx[/dy][+v[pen]] ] [ -F[+a[angle]][+c[justify]][+f[font]][+j[justify]][+h|l|r[first] |ttext|z[format]] ] [ -G[fill][+n] ] [ -L ] [ -M ] [ -N ] [ -Q l|u ] [ -U[stamp] ] [ -V[level] ] [ -W pen ] [ -X[a|c|f|r][xshift] ] [ -Y[a|c|f|r][yshift] ] [ -Z ] [ -acol=name[…] ] [ -e regexp ] [ -f flags ] [ -h headers ] [ -itword ] [ -p flags ] [ -qi flags ] [ -t transp ] [ -:[i|o] ] [ --PAR=value ]

Note: No space is allowed between the option flag and the associated arguments.

## Description

text plots text strings of variable size, font type, and orientation. Various map projections are provided, with the option to draw and annotate the map boundaries. Greek characters, subscript, superscript, and small caps are supported as follows: The sequence @~ toggles between the selected font and Greek (Symbol). @%no% sets the font to no; @%% resets the font to the starting font, @- toggles subscripts on/off, @+ toggles superscript on/off, @# toggles small caps on/off, @;color; changes the font color (@;; resets it), @:size: changes the font size (@:: resets it), and @_ toggles underline on/off. @@ prints the @ sign while @. prints the degree symbol. @a, @c, @e, @i, @n, @o, @s, @u, @A, @C, @E, @N, @O, and @U give various accented European characters, as indicated in Table escape. Composite characters (overstrike) may be indicated with the @!<char1><char2> sequence, which will print the two characters on top of each other. To learn the octal codes for symbols not available on the keyboard and some accented European characters, see Section Character escape sequences and Appendix Chart of Octal Codes for Characters in the GMT Technical Reference and Cookbook. Note that PS_CHAR_ENCODING must be set to an extended character set in your gmt.conf file in order to use the accented characters. Using the -G or -W options, a rectangle underlying the text may be plotted (does not work for strings with sub/super scripts, symbols, or composite characters, except in paragraph mode (-M)).

## Required Arguments

-Jparameters (more …)

  Select map projection.

-Rxmin/xmax/ymin/ymax[+r][+uunit] (more …)

  Specify the region of interest.

For perspective view -p, optionally append /zmin/zmax. (more …)

## Optional Arguments

textfiles

  This is one or more files containing 1 or more records with (x, y[, font, angle, justify], text). The attributes in brackets can alternatively be set directly via -F. If no files are given, text will read standard input. font is a font specification with format [size,][font,][color] where size is text size in points, font is the font to use, and color sets the font color. To draw outline fonts you append =pen to the font specification. The angle is measured in degrees counter-clockwise from horizontal, and justify sets the alignment. If font is not an integer, then it is taken to be a text string with the desired font name (see -L for available fonts). The alignment refers to the part of the text string that will be mapped onto the (x,y) point. Choose a 2 character combination of L, C, R (for left, center, or right) and T, M, B for top, middle, or bottom. e.g., BL for lower left.

-A

  Angles are given as azimuths; convert them to directions using the current projection.

-B[p|s]parameters (more …)

  Set map boundary frame and axes attributes.

-C[dx/dy][+to|O|c|C]

  Adjust the clearance between the text and the surrounding box [15%]. Only used if -W or -G are specified. Append the unit you want (cm, inch, or point; if not given we consult PROJ_LENGTH_UNIT) or % for a percentage of the font size. Optionally, use modifier +t to set the shape of the textbox when using -G and/or -W. Append lower case o to get a straight rectangle [Default]. Append upper case O to get a rounded rectangle. In paragraph mode (-M) you can also append lower case c to get a concave rectangle or append upper case C to get a convex rectangle.

-D[j|J]dx[/dy][+v[pen]]

  Offsets the text from the projected (x,y) point by dx,dy [0/0]. If dy is not specified then it is set equal to dx. Use -Dj to offset the text away from the point instead (i.e., the text justification will determine the direction of the shift). Using -DJ will shorten diagonal offsets at corners by sqrt(2). Optionally, append +v which will draw a line from the original point to the shifted point; append a pen to change the attributes for this line.

-F[+a[angle]][+c[justify]][+f[font]][+j[justify]][+h|l|r[first] |ttext|z[format]]

  By default, text will be placed horizontally, using the primary annotation font attributes (FONT_ANNOT_PRIMARY), and centered on the data point. Use this option to override these defaults by specifying up to three text attributes (font, angle, and justification) directly on the command line. Use +f to set the font (size,fontname,color); if no font info is given then the input file must have this information in one of its columns. Use +a to set the angle; if no angle is given then the input file must have this as a column. Alternatively, use +A to force text-baselines to convert into the -90/+90 range. Use +j to set the justification; if no justification is given then the input file must have this as a column. Items read from the data file should be in the same order as specified with the -F option. Example: -F+f12p,Helvetica-Bold,red+j+a selects a 12p red Helvetica-Bold font and expects to read the justification and angle from the file, in that order, after x, y and before text. In addition, the +c justification lets us use x,y coordinates extracted from the -R string instead of providing them in the input file. For example -F+cTL gets the x_min, y_max from the -R string and plots the text at the Upper Left corner of the map. Normally, the text to be plotted comes from the data record. Instead, use +h or +l to select the text as the most recent segment header or segment label, respectively in a multisegment input file, +r to use the record number (counting up from first), +ttext to set a fixed text string (if text contains plus characters then the +t modifier must be the last modifier in -F), or +z to format incoming z values to a string using the supplied format [use FORMAT_FLOAT_MAP]. Note: If -Z is in effect then the z value used for formatting is in the 4th, not 3rd column. If you only want a specific word from the trailing text and not the whole line, use -itword to indicate which word (0 is the first word) you want.

-G[fill][+n]

  Sets the shade or color used for filling the text box [Default is no fill]. Alternatively, give no fill to plot text and then use the text dimensions (and -C) to build clip paths and turn clipping on. This clipping can then be turned off later with clip -C. To not plot the text but activate clipping, use -G+n instead.

-L

  Lists the font-numbers and font-names available, then exits.

-M

  Paragraph mode. Files must be multiple segment files. Segments are separated by a special record whose first character must be flag [Default is >]. Starting in the 3rd column, we expect to find information pertaining to the typesetting of a text paragraph (the remaining lines until next segment header). The information expected is (x y [font angle justify] linespace parwidth parjust), where x y font angle justify are defined above (font, angle, and justify can be set via -F), while linespace and parwidth are the linespacing and paragraph width, respectively. The justification of the text paragraph is governed by parjust which may be l(eft), c(enter), r(ight), or j(ustified). The segment header is followed by one or more lines with paragraph text. Text may contain the escape sequences discussed above. Separate paragraphs with a blank line. Note that here, the justification set via -F+j applies to the box alignment since the text justification is set by parjust.

-N

  Do NOT clip text at map boundaries [Default will clip].

-Ql|u

  Change all text to either lower or upper case [Default leaves all text as is].

-U[label][+c][+jjust][+odx/dy] (more …)

  Draw GMT time stamp logo on plot.

-V[level] (more …)

  Select verbosity level [w].

-Wpen

  Sets the pen used to draw a rectangle around the text string (see -C) [Default is width = default, color = black, style = solid].

-X[a|c|f|r][xshift]

-Y[a|c|f|r][yshift] (more …)

  Shift plot origin.

-Z

  For 3-D projections: expect each item to have its own level given in the 3rd column, and -N is implicitly set. (Not implemented for paragraph mode).

-a[col=]name[,…] (more …)

  Set aspatial column associations col=name.

-e[~]“pattern” | -e[~]/regexp/[i] (more …)

  Only accept data records that match the given pattern.

-f[i|o]colinfo (more …)

  Specify data types of input and/or output columns.

-h[i|o][n][+c][+d][+msegheader][+rremark][+ttitle] (more …)

  Skip or produce header record(s).

-itword

  In this module, -it can be used to select a specific word from the trailing text [Default is the entire trailing text]. The word indicates the word order, with the first word being 0. No numerical columns can be specified.

-:[i|o] (more …)

  Swap 1st and 2nd column on input and/or output.

-p[x|y|z]azim[/elev[/zlevel]][+wlon0/lat0[/z0]][+vx0/y0] (more …)

  Select perspective view. (Not implemented for paragraph mode).

-qi[~]rows[+ccol][+a|f|s] (more …)

  Select input rows or data range(s) [all].

-t[transp] (more …)

  Set transparency level in percent.

If no transparency is appended then we will read it from the last column per data record instead.

-^ or just -

  Print a short message about the syntax of the command, then exit (NOTE: on Windows just use -).

-+ or just +

  Print an extensive usage (help) message, including the explanation of any module-specific option (but not the GMT common options), then exit.

-? or no arguments

  Print a complete usage (help) message, including the explanation of all options, then exit.

--PAR=value

  Temporarily override a GMT default setting; repeatable. See gmt.conf for parameters.

## Examples

Note: Below are some examples of valid syntax for this module. The examples that use remote files (file names starting with `@`) can be cut and pasted into your terminal for testing. Other commands requiring input files are just dummy examples of the types of uses that are common but cannot be run verbatim as written.

Note: Since many GMT plot examples are very short (i.e., one module call between the gmt begin and gmt end commands), we will often present them using the quick modern mode GMT Modern Mode One-line Commands syntax, which simplifies such short scripts.

To plot just the red outlines of the (lon lat text strings) stored in the file text.txt on a Mercator plot with the given specifications, use

>     gmt text text.txt -R-30/30/-10/20 -Jm0.1i -F+f18p,Helvetica,-=0.5p,red -B5 -pdf plot

To plot a text at the upper left corner of a 10 cm map

>     echo TopLeft | gmt text -R1/10/1/10 -JX10 -F+cTL -pdf plot

To add a typeset figure caption for a 3-inch wide illustration, use

>     gmt text -R0/3/0/5 -JX3i -O -h1 -M -N -F+f12,Times-Roman+jLT -pdf figure << EOF
>     This is an unmarked header record not starting with #
>     > 0 -0.5 13p 3i j
>     @%5%Figure 1.@%% This illustration shows nothing useful, but it still needs
>     a figure caption. Highlighted in @;255/0/0;red@;; you can see the locations
>     of cities where it is @\_impossible@\_ to get any good Thai food; these are to be avoided.
>     EOF

## Windows Remarks

Note that under Windows, the percent sign (%) is a variable indicator (like $ under Unix). To indicate a plain percentage sign in a batch script you need to repeat it (%%); hence the font switching mechanism (@%font% and @%%) may require twice the number of percent signs. This only applies to text inside a script or that otherwise is processed by DOS. Data files that are opened and read by the module do not need such duplication.

## Composite Characters

If the two characters that are to be combined come from different fonts (say, Symbol and Times), then it is allowed for the second character (but not the first) to be surrounded by escape codes to temporarily change the font for that character. For instance, the sequence “@!\227@~\145@~” will print the epsilon character (octal code \145 from the Symbol font) with time-derivative indicated by the over-printed dot (octal code \227 from the current font, assuming the ISOLatin1 character set).

## Limitations

In paragraph mode, the presence of composite characters and other escape sequences may lead to unfortunate word splitting. Also, if a font is requested with an outline pen it will not be used in paragraph mode. Note if any single word is wider than your chosen paragraph width then the paragraph width is automatically enlarged to fit the widest word.

## Use from external interface

When the module is called from external interfaces then we impose the following condition on the -F setting: We require that +a (read angle from input), if specified, must appear before either of +f (read font from input) and +j (read justification from input), if these are present. This is necessary because the angle is a numerical column while font and justification must be encoded as part of the trailing text.

## Adding more fonts

To add custom fonts, please see General Features.

## See Also

gmt, gmt.conf, clip, gmtcolors, psconvert, basemap, legend, plot