Reset the graphical parameters back to default values without use of dev.off()

Question

Such as margins, orientations and such...

dev.off() does not work for me. I am often using RStudio, with its inbuilt graphics device. I then have plotting functions, which I want to plot either in the default RStudio graphics device, or if I called X11(), before in a new window.

This behaviour doesn't work with dev.off(). If my plotting function always calls dev.off(), it might inadvertently close the X11() window and instead plot in the RStudio device. If I always call dev.off() followed by X11(), it would always plot in a new window, even if I wanted to plot in the RStudio device.

Ordinarily that could be solved with getOption("device"), however, that always returns RStudioGD.

Answer 1

See ?par. The idea is that you save them as they are when you found them, and then restore:

old.par <- par(mar = c(0, 0, 0, 0))
## do plotting stuff with new settings

Now restore as they were before we changed mar:

par(old.par)

Answer 2

In RStudio, You can just navigate to 'Plots' and select 'Remove plots'

Answer 3

If you already missed saving the default parameters at startup, and you don't want to restart the session, then you can open a terminal and run R by (usually) typing R.

Then type:

par()

It will print all the default values.

You can save them in a text file and import into the workspace that you are currently working in.

Answer 4

a simple function containing all the defaults can do the job:

  reset_par <- function(){
    op <- structure(list(xlog = FALSE, ylog = FALSE, adj = 0.5, ann = TRUE,
                         ask = FALSE, bg = "transparent", bty = "o", cex = 1, 
                         cex.axis = 1, cex.lab = 1, cex.main = 1.2, cex.sub = 1, 
                         col = "black", col.axis = "black", col.lab = "black", 
                         col.main = "black", col.sub = "black", crt = 0, err = 0L, 
                         family = "", fg = "black", fig = c(0, 1, 0, 1), 
                         fin = c(6.99999895833333, 6.99999895833333), font = 1L, 
                         font.axis = 1L, font.lab = 1L, font.main = 2L, 
                         font.sub = 1L, lab = c(5L, 5L, 7L), las = 0L, 
                         lend = "round", lheight = 1, ljoin = "round", lmitre = 10, 
                         lty = "solid", lwd = 1, mai = c(1.02, 0.82, 0.82, 0.42), 
                         mar = c(5.1, 4.1, 4.1, 2.1), mex = 1, mfcol = c(1L, 1L), 
                         mfg = c(1L, 1L, 1L,1L), mfrow = c(1L, 1L), 
                         mgp = c(3, 1, 0), mkh = 0.001, new = FALSE, 
                         oma = c(0, 0, 0, 0), omd = c(0, 1, 0, 1), 
                         omi = c(0, 0, 0,0), pch = 1L, 
                         pin = c(5.75999895833333, 5.15999895833333),
                         plt = c(0.117142874574832, 0.939999991071427, 
                                 0.145714307397962, 0.882857125425167), 
                         ps = 12L, pty = "m", smo = 1, srt = 0, tck = NA_real_, 
                         tcl = -0.5, usr = c(0.568, 1.432, 0.568, 1.432), 
                         xaxp = c(0.6, 1.4, 4), xaxs = "r", xaxt = "s", 
                         xpd = FALSE, yaxp = c(0.6, 1.4, 4), yaxs = "r", 
                         yaxt = "s", ylbias = 0.2), 
                         .Names = c("xlog", "ylog", "adj", "ann", "ask", "bg", 
                         "bty", "cex", "cex.axis", "cex.lab", "cex.main", "cex.sub", 
                         "col", "col.axis", "col.lab", "col.main", "col.sub", "crt", 
                         "err", "family", "fg", "fig", "fin", "font", "font.axis", 
                         "font.lab", "font.main", "font.sub", "lab", "las", "lend", 
                         "lheight", "ljoin", "lmitre", "lty", "lwd", "mai", "mar", 
                         "mex", "mfcol", "mfg", "mfrow", "mgp", "mkh", "new", "oma",
                         "omd", "omi", "pch", "pin", "plt", "ps", "pty", "smo", 
                         "srt", "tck", "tcl", "usr", "xaxp", "xaxs", "xaxt", "xpd", 
                         "yaxp", "yaxs", "yaxt", "ylbias"))
  par(op)
  }

call it using:

reset_par()

Answer 5

For margins ?par provides a default value of c(5,4,4,2)+0.1. The following should reset the margins to the default values.

par(mar=c(5,4,4,2)+0.1)

Answer 6

The canonical answer was only in a comment (by Cookie), and might easily be overlooked:

Get the current/default parameters

old.par <- par(no.readonly = TRUE)

Set them in your code, e.g.

par(mai=c(0,0,0,0))

And then you can reset the pars with

par(old.par)

Or, in a function

on.exit(par(old.par))