Saveas (visible, off)

Hi I'm working on a script that creates a load of plots then saves them as individual fig files as well as all into a pdf file.

The problem I'm having is that although I've set visible to off, the plots still come up after going through the saveas function, so now I have to resort to using 'close all' after each graph. But even close all cause the graphs to flash up momentarily.

This is very annoying as I want the whole process invisible and not interfering with my desktop space.

Please help

Thanks

This is my script:

 %%Throttle

 i = i + 1;

 figure(i)

 set(gcf,'Visible','off','PaperOrientation', 
'landscape','PaperPositionMode','manual','PaperPosition',[0.1, 0.1,30, 20]')
set(gca,'fontsize',10);

% Set Parameters to Plot

 if exist('Accelerator_Pedal_Position'); plot(Elapsed_Time,    Accelerator_Pedal_Position,'LineWidth', 1 ); else plot (0,NaN,'w');  end;

 h=legend('Accelerator\_Pedal\_Position');
    set(h,'fontsize',6);

 % Set title for plot

 title(['220HP'; 'Automated Manual';raw(3);'Throttle']);

 %Set Labels for X and Y Axes'

 xlabel ('Elapsed Time (s)');
 ylabel ('Accelerator\_Pedal\_Positionn (%)')

 xlim ([-inf inf])

 grid on;
 box on;

 fpath = 'D:\Users\km933\Documents\MATLAB\Field Test v1';

 saveas(figure(i), fullfile(fpath, 'Throttle'), 'fig');

 print -dpsc -append myfile

 close all

[Aadil]

anyone?

Answer 1

[Robert Cumming]

When you create your figure set the position to be off your screen, i.e.

'position', [10000 10000 800 600]

That way it wont be displayed on your desktop.

[Aadil]

will that affect the position in the pdf file?

[Robert Cumming]

shouldn't do no - thats controlled by the papersize/position properties.

[Aadil]

Great, this works nice one mate cheers

[Aadil]

right, after checking my figure files I've discovered that this method causes the figures to be invisible ie. when you click to open the file nothing opens as its positioned off the screen

Answer 2

[Titus Edelhofer]

Hi Aadil,

the problem I guess is the call figure(i) in saveas. Just use

save(i, fullfile(...));

One minor issue: do you need the figure to be numbered? Otherwise I would usually suggest something like

% create invisible figure
hFigure = figure('Visible','off','PaperOrientation', 
'landscape','PaperPositionMode','manual','PaperPosition',[0.1, 0.1,30, 20]');

% do your plotting etc.
% and save:
save(hFigure, fullfile(...));

% and close it:
close(hFigure);

Titus

[Titus Edelhofer]

Forgot to explain: save wants to have the figure number, so either "i" or gcf.

The call figure(i) makes the figure the current figure AND makes it visible on top of other figures.

[Aadil]

I'm not sure about the numbering, I thought it would be needed in order to not have the figures overriden.

I tried your method without the numbering, still had the same problem.

but thanks anyway

[Jan]

@Aadil: Can you confirm, that the SAVE command makes the figure visible?

Either use the debugger by setting a breakpoint in the code and step through the program line by line, or use "disp('before save'); pause(1);" and "disp('after save')".

[Aadil]

I'm not sure,I had a look at the code and don't really understand it

Answer 3

[Jan]

Some functions to copy the contents of a figure requires an enabled visibility. I assume it is print in your case, but I've seen this behaviour for getframe only yet.

I assume there is no workaround and getting annoyed is not good solution. I suggest a coffee break.

[Aadil]

no I've tried it with just the print function and the graphs stay invisible, its when I want them to be saved as fig files that causes them to flash up again

I'm assuming this flashing up of graphs is also slowing the process down?

[Robert Cumming]

yes the rendering will be making it slower.

Answer 4

[Sebastian]

I've also created a routine like Aadil in which many plots were created, saved, reloaded, updated and again saved... all automagically.

I created it in Matlab 2010a (Win XP) and it worked great, as the figures were all the time invisible (no need to plot outside the screen), and it worked fast...

Now that I have R2011b and Win 7, the routine became slower and it shows every figure before it is saved.

Any way to change it back ? is it Win 7 or the newer Matlab Version ?

Best regards,

Answer 5

[Igor Varfolomeev]

If anyone is still looking for an answer, take a look at this post - I've just tried to collect all known workarounds in a single post.