Time plot

Sometimes, it’s necessary to observe how a parameter varies over time. The plot has the parameter on the y axis and the time on the x axis. In this example, the data is organised in four columns: year, month, day and price of the diesel fuel. The function datenum is first used to convert the original data (the first three columns) to the x coordinates and then the function datevec is used to create the labels on the x axis. Last, a ‘fast’ cubic spline is used for connecting the points.

If you are in need of a plot type that’s not available in Scilab, by default, you can write it with some lines of code. The code necessary for the calculations is relatively short and most of it (and perhaps, the most boring part) is dedicated to