Is there a good way to plot multiple lines in letsplot with different y-axis scales? I have time se...

# datascience

[Carter]

Is there a good way to plot multiple lines in letsplot with different y-axis scales?

I have time series sensor data (e.g. think ECG versus accelerometer or unfiltered versus filtered waveforms), and having them overlayed but stretched for different y scales would be helpful for some analysis. ECG/accelerometer have totally different scales, while filtered data is 0 centered and raw data is not.

I tried adding two geomLines on the same plot. They show up, but due to different y axis scales the lines aren’t readable. I also tried doing a GGBunch() without changing the x/y coordinates but only a single line shows up which makes me think one graph is completely covering the other.

Other ideas or approaches for doing this?

[Carter]

This is an example of what I’m currently getting by adding two geomLines, but the different y scales make it hard to visually compare.

[altavir]

Not a lot of plotting libraries allow multiple axis scales. I am not sure about LetsPlot, but I remember that JFreeChart allows that.

[Carter]

JFreeChart was going to be my fallback, but hoping to leverage LetsPlot if possible to keep my codebase more sane 🙂

[Andrei Kislitsyn]

Well, unfortunately, there is no way in lets-plot to set several scales along one axis (. If I understand everything correctly, facetGrid with the parameterization of the freeScales parameter could help you!

[altavir]

NB for@Andrei Kislitsyn: I was talking about this case before. It is not frequent, but it does exist.

[Carter]

The best example I have is raw versus butterworth filtered waveforms, as I’m trying to see what kind of filter delay I’m dealing with.

Once I get it graphed with JFreeChart I’ll share an example.

[Andrei Kislitsyn]

Another possible solution is to make one scale but with a transformation, for example scaleYLog10

[Igor Alshannikov]

This wont work with values <=0 🙂

[Igor Alshannikov]

@Carter you can try GGBunch approach but set plot background color to transparent (via theme()) for the 2nd plot&

[Andrei Kislitsyn]

Well if you have negative values you can shift all the values to some offset, make a scale log and then change the labels)

[Igor Alshannikov]

also remove y-axis altogether.

[Carter]

OK, let me try the GGBunch approach and I’ll report back.

[Igor Alshannikov]

Perhaps, a better idea would be to have all the data (both lines) in 1 geomLine layer and use position = positionStack on that layer to stack one line ontop of another.

[Carter]

Can you say more about the position = positionStack approach? I’m not sure I totally follow.

I tried GGBunch with transparency but either I configured it incorrectly or I did something wrong. I got a graph with just a single line representing the first graph but with a different color background

For the second plot, I added

+ themeMinimal2() + theme(plotBackground = elementRect(fill=Color.TRANSPARENT, color = Color.TRANSPARENT))

[Igor Alshannikov]

I'll give you an example on `position`:

val line1 = listOf(1.0, 1.2, 0.9)
val line2 = line1.map { it + 10000}
val line = line2 + line1 // <-- important: line2 goes 1st, line1 - 2nd

val dat = mapOf(
    "y" to line,
    "x" to List(line2.size) { it } + List(line1.size) { it },
    "c" to List(line2.size) { "line 2" } + List(line1.size) { "line 1" }
)

Now, if we simply create a line plot, the result is not useful:

letsPlot(dat) + geomLine {
    x = "x"
    y = "y"
    color = "c"
}

[Igor Alshannikov]

But if we add stacking, then we will be able to compare values:

letsPlot(dat) + geomLine(position = positionStack) {
    x = "x"
    y = "y"
    color = "c"
}

[Igor Alshannikov]

As for plot background, this code works for me:

val dat2 = mapOf(
    "line1" to line1,
    "line2" to line2,
    "x" to List(line2.size) { it },
)

val bunch = GGBunch()

val t = theme(plotBackground = elementRect(fill = "rgba(0,0,0,0)"))

bunch.addPlot(letsPlot(dat2) + geomLine(color = "red") {x = "x"; y = "line1"}, 0, 0)
bunch.addPlot(letsPlot(dat2) + geomLine(color = "blue") {x = "x"; y = "line2"} + t, 0, 0)

[Igor Alshannikov]

Actually, the "facetGrid" approach coined by @Andrei Kislitsyn works the best IMO:

letsPlot(dat) + geomLine {
    x = "x"
    y = "y"
    color = "c"
} + facetGrid(y="c", scales="free_y") + ggsize(600, 200)

[altavir]

It seems like Plotly actually allows multiple axis. So if the plot is for web, you can use it.