TouchPlot App Reviews

TouchPlot makes beautiful graphs without complicated instructions or a cluttered interface. Multiple graphs are a snap. Parametric plots are delightfully easy. Finding zeros, and extrema couldnt be simpler. Direct Polish is no trouble at all; just think ahead. As a bonus, equations are nicely formatted. This app almost makes graphing on a calculator obsolete. Tiny quibble: After typing a function, touching "OK" sends the user back to the menu for the function. But after clearing a function ("C"), touching "OK" does not send the user back to the menu for the function; touching "C" again sends the user back. I believe thats inconsistent. After a function is cleared, the user should go to the function menu after touching either "C" or "OK." Suggestion for enhancement: Drag and zoom menu only: double-tap the screen when the menus are visible gives a cross-hair that can be moved with your finger and a readout of the cross-hair position becomes visible. Of course the touch functions (changing the graphs view by sliding one finger, or spreading two fingers) become inoperable while the cross-hair is visible. Double-tap the screen (menus still visible) and the cross-hair disappears. Usual touch functions return to normal.

This is a pretty nice plotting app and will hopefully get even better. The slider bars for manipulating constants are very useful; the UI for this is more straightforward than what you find in many computer graphing packages, though I find the sliders hard to put my fingers on sometimes. The pinch interface for zooming in on functions is especially slick. The equation entry system is a bit of a challenge at first, though it makes equations that are nice to see. Hopefully an equation system similar to Apples Grapher.app can show up eventually. As of 8/8/08, here are some features that I hope will show up later: - More special functions (e.g. gamma function and its log, digammas, beta function, Bessel functions, hypergeometric series, probability distribution functions, etc.) - A way to get the numerical value of a function at x. - More plots at once. - Inequalities.

This is a really cool app. The formula editor isnt really that difficult to figure out. There are also helpful tutorials on the authors website. It creates some really nice graphs. For the price and the functionality of this app, it is well worth it.

if there was ( ) in the function editor it would be much better.

I use mathematica / matlab on Mac. I wanted some handy tool to plot on the road, and this looks to be a good candidate. Plots are pretty nice. The setting of the equation is not quite what I like, but is OK. I want two features added to make this one much easier for me to use. One is to save the entire setting, including equations, boundaries, etc, by a name. Later I load the setting by selecting from a list. I often use same functions with small modifications, and, for now, I have to start anew, each time. Second is, somehow, I want to edit the equations. I wrote a complex formula, examined, and found I missed a sqrt. I dont want to start from a scratch. The programmer is very responsive and I believe this software will become much more handy, soon.

where are parenthesis?????? without them this app is totally useless. there should be the option to remember used function, to create your own liblrary of functions.

Im surprised by the functionality of this program and its ability to produce graphs quickly. However, in engineering, its nearly useless for school without parenthesis!! MUST have parenthesis!!

Second review - after owning this for a while: If it takes me (a math nerd) more than five minutes to plot y=x^2, then something is wrong here. Still, the navigation stinks - moving up and down through multiple screens to edit a graphing function. Theres no way to go back to the main screen if you go down the wrong path - you need to enter a formula to navigate back. Still, it takes me much longer to do any graphing with this tool than with GraphFunc or iCalc3d (which also has 3D plotting). So, I wish I could up my stars, but this still comes across as a 2nd year college project. Nice try. No stars.

This is a shockingly powerful graphing calculator. When you open it, you can chose to define one or two single variable functions, or a parametric curve in Cartesian or polar coordinates, or a function of two variables, or an ordinary differential equation (first or second order). Once you have a function defined, it can graph it along with its derivative-- which it can calculate algebraically. TouchPlot can also calculate a sequence of values for the function, and solve for roots or intersection points. I got a lot more than I was expecting for my $4.99. Many of the requested features seem to be here (I didnt have the older version). Several reviewers have complained about the interface, but I had no trouble with it at all. The only awkwardness in the function editor comes from not having a parentheses button, but this really is unnecessary. You simply enter the operations in the proper order. For example, (1+2)*3 would be entered by tapping the multiplication button, then addition, and then the numbers 1, 2, and 3. This doesnt take long to get used to. There are a few imperfections: first, while the function editor includes all the usual elementary functions, floor and ceiling functions, there are no other special functions, like the factorial function, or any special statistics function. You cant save functions you arent using, except by turning their graphs off, which prevents you from putting another function in its place. You can zoom in and out on the graph only by pinching, which makes it difficult to keep the axes on the same scale. However, the graphs look great, and they can be 3D, with contours, or inequalities-- I still cant get over how much TouchPlot can do, and I still havent explored half of it.

I used this app almost 3 weeks ago The icon was suddenly change. If the icon is change more good thing, that would be 5 stars!

I began graphing in my calculus class yesterday, and I have a feeling this program is what will save me. TouchPlot comes in handy for checking my work, and it seems to do a great job of graphing real quick, too. Theres lots of options, (like having compound functions, boy I wasnt expecting that) And a cool thing about the graph is that you can zoom in with two fingers, but if you just want to widen it one way without simply zooming in, thats possible. The interface for writing the equations definitely needs some polishing, though. the graphics for the buttons are missing that pleasing shine to them, and the difficulty level for just writing the equations is a little less than intuitive. It took me about five minutes just to figure out how to apply an exponent to x. Beyond that, however, I was able to figure it out, and I dont think it was that hard to do so; it just wouldve been better if it had even more out of the box userability. That all having been said, its a great program, it definitely gets the job done, and done well.

other than having no ( ) this is a great application, well worth the cash.

I dont think it would be too hard to incorporate a solver for systems of des with a field gen etc. would be grrrrreat!!! the notation is cool

This is now my favorite plotting tool. Once I got the hang of direct polish entry, keying in equations was much faster than any other method I have seen on other graphers. The author has made this a very powerful and slick app, invaluable for my college calculus, physics, & engineering courses. One small suggestion is the ability to hand enter constants, x,y values, limits of integration, etc. from the graph screen rather than wading through a few menus. The sliders are great, but sometimes its hard to get them right on the nose.

is just to much frindly... great app... worth the money...

Excellent and useful program! Powerful. One feature I would like to see added is a way to set the limits of an integral with a number, rather than just by dragging a finger on the screen. This would take an already excellent program and make it more useful.

Listen, many of us have grown up learning to use parenthesis, however after using this app for a while Ive gotten used to it and like it better. It saves so much time because everything you put in the app is exactly how you would write it down. So stop ranting about those and think about whats good about the app. The developer has obviously put alot of work into the app and I know that I use it all the time. And im sure most if you do aswell. To top it off I just have to say that I highly suggest this to anyone in a calculus class.

Pleaseadd parenthesis so I can pass class well I do like the app I highly recomend it because its really good. But I guess I need help pluggin in quadractic equations like with square roots and stuff yea its hard to explain

TouchPlot on my iPodTouch is a great complement to figures produced by Maple on my desktop & portable and Geogebra on my webpages. I am especially pleased this app (which began its i-life as a professional product) has gotten several good improvements by its involved developer.

This app has very good features, but I am giving it only two stars because its very hard to use. The function editor doesnt show you the current position where you edit, only if you start to use the selector tool... but then it is very hard to insert or remove something from the formula... you get frustrated and start from scratch, only to repeat all this again. For instance, you write sin, then 8, then pi, then x to make it sin(8*pi*x) but you get sin(8)*pi*x, you try to edit this by getting into the braces but may get sin(pi*x*8) and it refuses to draw this! Guys, please make it work like a normal text editor does, it is very hard to use this app.