Question

I am looking for a plotting/graphing library (mostly to do line plots) for my application. I have been looking at JavaScript APIs (like Google’s) but I found them to be slowing down things at client side (I am plotting a quite large number of points). I also found that with client-side libraries, the performance was quite varied depending on the user’s computer. With moving to a server-side library I would cut down on this variance, and would have more control over data flow (my data is in a MySQL database).

I have then looked at some PHP-based plotting libraries, but a lot of them seem to be “forgotten” (no new version for years). I have been eying pChart, but it has not had an update in almost two years.

First, what would you recommend: server-side or client-side approach?

Second, what library would you recommend. Paid libraries are definitely an option, as I don’t mind paying for quality software that would cut down on my development time.

Thanks,

Answer 1

Personally I use the server-side jpGraph for most of my charting work, and fusionCharts (commercial) for flash-based client-side charting, although I’m looking at openFlashCharts at the moment