WHAT IS PLUTON AND HOW TO GET STARTED

PLUTON

The previously available standalone molecular graphics program PLUTON, a decendent of the well known PLUTO78, is now available as an option within PLATON. The original PLUTON is now obsolete and no longer supported & maintained.

There are six ways to run the PLUTON option within PLATON.

The first three provide a direct path to PLUTON, the last three an indirect path.

1. With the '-p' option on the command line

   Example: platon -p sucrose.spf

2. With a 'softlink' of 'pluton' to the 'platon' executable:

   i.e. ln -s platon pluton

   sothat PLUTON can be invoked as usual: pluton sucrose.spf

3. Clicking on 'toPluton' in the PLATON menu on the right side.

4. The PLATON keyboard instruction 'PLUTON'

5. Clicking in the main PLATON-MENU on the button PLUTONauto will result in a PLATON-run to generate an input file for PLUTON to make both consistent.

6. Clicking on PLUTON-ELD in the ORTEP-menu.

SHORT INTRO TO PLUTON

(This is the 'direct path' version assuming Tektronix emulation; the X-windows mode runs slightly different)

PLUTON is a program for interactive molecular graphics. It is designed for use in a crystallographic context. However, it can be used for the display and analyses of molecules in an orthogonal (Angstrom) coordinate system as well.

Method of use:

• Pertinent data are given on/ read from a file (normally prepared either with an editor or by another program. The data may be in several formats including those of the supplied testdata files. Formats that should work are: CIF, shelxl.res, PDB, Cart3d, Fdat. The name of the file is not essential i.e. no information on the file contents is taken from its name. The data type is guessed from the file contents.

• The program is started with the command line 'pluton cyto.spf' with the data-file as argument.

• The program prompts the user for instructions (A build-in help function lists all available instructions). Most instructions are defaulted. A PLUTON session consists of a cyclic process of content/style/viewpoint type of modification instructions and a PLOT instruction to inspect the result of the current settings.

• As an example, try the following simple sequence of instructions with the 'cyto.spf' file. (Note: Instructions given in upper-case here, however lower case is also acceptable)

      a) PLOT        This will give a default stick style plot. The plot 
                     style may be changed into the 'straw-mode' with the
                     instruction
  
      b) STRAW       (Note: Keyboard control is retained after hitting the
                            Return key)
  
                     followed by:
  
      c) PLOT        to inspect the result.
  
      d) XROT 45     followed by
  
      e) PLOT        will result in a molecule rotated by 45 degrees 
                     over the horizontal X-axis.
  
      f) CPK GLOBE   will change again the plot style into a space filling
                     model followed by 
      g) PLOT
  
      h) SET META PS and   (Note: Postscript is default on UNIX versions)
  
      i) SET META ON and
  
      j) PLOT        will generate a disk-file that can be send to a
                     PostScript laserprinter (Other options are described
                     in the HELP GRAPHICS option
  
      k) END         finishes the session
  

  For more details see PLUTON MANUAL