Zooming in the Plot Area

The plot area that displays the function and its control points normally auto-scales to show all of the points. However, if you want to pan or zoom the view to focus on a particular area, there are several ways you can do this.

• Select a rectangular area – To select a rectangular area to zoom in on, press the left mouse button at the upper-left corner of the rectangle, and hold it down while sweeping down (dragging) to the lower-right corner. When you release the left mouse button, the rectangle you defined will be expanded to fit the entire plot area.

• Hot keys – Press the i and o keys to zoom the view in or out, respectively. The zooming is centered on the current cursor location. To pan the view of the function, use the l, r, u, and d keys to move it left, right, up, and down, respectively.

• Dialog box– For more precise control over the zooming of the plot, click on the Properties button at the bottom of the Function Editor. In the dialog box for Plot Properties that appears, click on the Plot tab and then on either the X Axis or the Y Axis tab. In the lower panel labeled Other, click on the Range tab to display the minimum and maximum values for the axis. Turn off the Auto-adjust Range checkbox if it is not already off, and then enter the exact minimum and maximum values you would like to use for that axis.

The Plot Properties dialog box gives you access to many properties for plotting the function. Shown here are the minimum and maximum values for the Y axis. To make the Function Editor auto-scale the Y axis to display all of the control points, turn on the Auto-adjust Range checkbox.

To undo any of the user-defined zooming and panning commands and return the plot to auto-scaling mode, you can either turn on the Auto-adjust Range checkboxes for the X axis and the Y axis (see details for the Plot Properties dialog box above), or you can rectangle-zoom in the opposite direction in the plot area—that is, while holding down the left mouse button, drag the cursor from the lower-right to the upper-left. When you release the left mouse button, the plot will auto-scale to show all of the control points.