Tools for creating LaTeX-integrated graphics and animations under GNU/Linux

Abstract

This paper describes how to easily create graphics and animations that can be included in LATEX documents. This article discusses three kinds of figures: plots, schematics, and pictures. The tools presented here can quickly generate plots, and are based on simple gnuplot and bash scripts that display the final result on the screen. Ipe is an excellent program to deal with complex figures and schematics, and the animate package is used to make a series of figures change over time to simulate a movie. All the programs used in this article are free software.