Interactive graphics for the Macintosh: software review of FlexiGraphs.
FlexiGraphs was a useful Mac graphing helper in 1990, but free modern tools now do the job better and faster.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Antonak (1990) tried out FlexiGraphs, a new Macintosh program for drawing research graphs.
The paper is a short product review, not an experiment. It tells readers what the software can and cannot do.
What they found
FlexiGraphs makes quick curve fits and prints clean charts on a Mac. It is handy, but it cannot replace heavy-duty statistics packages on mainframes.
How this fits with other research
Aydin et al. (2022) now give you a free, cross-platform tool called PlotDigitizer that pulls data points off published graphs with near-perfect accuracy. FlexiGraphs only drew curves; PlotDigitizer also extracts the numbers again.
Moeyaert et al. (2016) compared four modern digitizing programs and crowned WebPlotDigitizer and Ungraph as fastest and easiest. Their head-to-head test updates the single-product review style used in Antonak (1990).
Cerutti (1989) reviewed Papyrus reference software the year before. Both papers read like old magazine buyer’s guides, showing how far software reviews have come.
Why it matters
If you still hunt for a graphing tool, skip the 1990 advice. Download PlotDigitizer or WebPlotDigitizer today. They are free, more accurate, and built for the single-case graphs you use in ABA.
Want CEUs on This Topic?
The ABA Clubhouse has 60+ free CEUs — live every Wednesday. Ethics, supervision & clinical topics.
Join Free →Download PlotDigitizer, open a scanned graph, and check how fast you can pull the data points into Excel.
02At a glance
03Original abstract
While this product is clearly unique, its usefulness to individuals outside small business environments is somewhat limited. FlexiGraphs is, however, a reasonable first attempt to design a microcomputer software package that controls data through interactive editing within a graph. Although the graphics capabilities of mainframe programs such as MINITAB (Ryan, Joiner, & Ryan, 1981) and the graphic manipulations available through exploratory data analysis (e.g., Velleman & Hoaglin, 1981) will not be surpassed anytime soon by this program, a researcher may want to add this program to a software library containing other Macintosh statistics, drawing, and graphics programs if only to obtain the easy-to-obtain curve fitting and line smoothing options. I welcome the opportunity to review the enhanced "scientific" version of FlexiGraphs that the author of the program indicates is currently under development. An MS-DOS version of the program should be available within the year.
Research in developmental disabilities, 1990 · doi:10.1016/0891-4222(90)90026-5