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What are the other common commands?

• Perhaps the most important thing to note in this context is that SM has a command line editor, which allows you to recall previously typed commands (use the up arrow to scroll back through them) and either them, or edit them. For those of you familiar with VMS, the command line editor is very similar to the one provided with that system.

• The next most important thing is that there is a ^C trap in SM, so if you start a command and regret it, you should be able to abort it by typing ^C.

• If you don't like the axes drawn for you with the box command, you can tailor them a bit more with the axis command.

• cursor invokes the device cursor (for devices that have one). You can then read positions from the screen by positioning the cursor, then typing any key except e or q. Those latter 2 keys are used to exit the cursor routine.

• end or quit causes SM to exit.

• expand changes the size of the points and characters drawn on the screen, as well as the size of axis tickmarks.

• format allows you to specify the format of the numbers that are plotted along the axes.

• help is a very important command. You can also specify help on a particular command with help <command_name>

• identification plots an identification line at the top of the graph, giving the date and some other information, of your choice.

• label allows you to plot a label on the graph, at the current location. You can specify different fonts and symbols, as described in the manual (see section 'Label' in The SM Manual).

• You can change the size of the plot window with the location command. But in general, if you want to plot more than one graph on the screen (or page) at once, you will probably use the window command (see section 'Window' in The SM Manual).

• lweight allows you to change the line thickness. This will also apply to characters that are plotted.

• By default, if the numbers you plotting on the axis are between 0.0001 and 10000, SM will write these numbers out in decimal format. The notation command allows you to specify the range of numbers that you want written out in this way, as opposed to being written out in exponential notation.

• relocate relocates the current plot position to wherever you specify when you issue the relocate command.

• ticksize is used to control the spacing of tickmarks on the axes. Its most common use is to define a logarithmic axis. To do this, the first and third argument to the ticksize command should be negative.

• window is used to draw more than one graph on a single screen (or piece of paper). As the name implies, it divides the default plot window into n by m subwindows. You can make the windows touch, if that is what you want to do.

There are many more commands, which are described at the back of the manual. You will regret not reading about them.

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