Dot plots

Dot plots represent individual observations in a batch of data with symbols , usually circular dots. They have been used for more than 100 years to dep ict distributions in detail. Hand-drawn examples show their authors' effort s to arrange symbols so that they are as near as possible to their proper l ocations on a scale without overlapping enough to obscure each other. Recen t computer programs that attempt to reproduce these historical plots have u nfortunately resorted to simple histogram binning instead of using methods that follow the rules for the hand-drawn examples. This article introduces an algorithm that more accurately represents the dot plots cited in the lit erature.