Path: news.mathworks.com!not-for-mail
From: "Jackie Larsen" <s052376@student.dtu.dk>
Newsgroups: comp.soft-sys.matlab
Subject: Re: Plot Nonorthogonal Coordinate Systems
Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 13:50:20 +0000 (UTC)
Organization: The MathWorks, Inc.
Lines: 8
Message-ID: <gidkes$9au$1@fred.mathworks.com>
References: <gibtca$1om$1@fred.mathworks.com> <24279765.1229576710076.JavaMail.jakarta@nitrogen.mathforum.org>
Reply-To: "Jackie Larsen" <s052376@student.dtu.dk>
NNTP-Posting-Host: webapp-03-blr.mathworks.com
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="ISO-8859-1"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit
X-Trace: fred.mathworks.com 1229608220 9566 172.30.248.38 (18 Dec 2008 13:50:20 GMT)
X-Complaints-To: news@mathworks.com
NNTP-Posting-Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2008 13:50:20 +0000 (UTC)
X-Newsreader: MATLAB Central Newsreader 1645064
Xref: news.mathworks.com comp.soft-sys.matlab:507748

Eric Belcastro <eric@telltree.com> wrote in message <24279765.1229576710076.JavaMail.jakarta@nitrogen.mathforum.org>...
> Matt: "Why couldn't you simply convert the data to Cartesian coordinates for the purpose of plotting?"
> 
> That is a very reasonable response - and the answer is that I can, and, in fact, the conversions are quite easy to make.  The reason that this isn't acceptable to me is that the entire existence of the coordinate system is allow for certain relationships to arise out of the representation, such that coordinates on the grid are represented by integers, and there transformations and corresponding eutrigonometric (eutrigon - triangle with 60 degrees, eutrigonometry utilizes the ratios of the sides of a 60 degree triangle instead of a right triangle, yes I just made the word up) relationships become self-evident in such a coordinate system.  When we are young we learn not to put triangle pegs in square holes. So I am looking for the triangle hole, the square hole will not suffice for my aims, it will only obscure, not clarify.

Well since you only need the "convenrsion" of the coordinates when doing the plotting, the solutions is simple to write your own plot function, which takes your coordinates in the special basis, and converts them prior to plotting. 

That way you keep your convention.