ColorSpec {no default}

Color of the displayed graphic scale — Controls the color of the graphic scale lines and text. You can specify a color using a vector of RGB values or one of the MATLAB^® predefined names. By default, the graphic scale is displayed in black ([0 0 0]).

{normal} | italic | oblique

Angle of the graphic scale label text — Controls the appearance of the graphic scale text components. Use any MATLAB font angles.

courier | {helvetica} | symbol | times

Font family name for all graphic scale labels — Sets the font for all displayed graphic scale labels. To display and print properly FontName must be a font that your system supports.

scalar in units specified in FontUnits {9}

Font size — Specifies the font size to use for all displayed graphic scale labels, in units specified by the FontUnits property. The default point size is 9.

inches | centimeters | normalized | {points} | pixels

Units used to interpret the FontSize property — When set to normalized, the toolbox interprets the value of FontSize as a fraction of the height of the axes. For example, a normalized FontSize of 0.16 sets the text characters to a font whose height is one-tenth of the axes' height. The default units, points, are equal to 1/72 of an inch.

light | {normal} | demi | bold

Select bold or normal font — The character weight for all displayed graphic scale labels.

character vector

Label text for the graphic scale — Contains a character vector used to label the graphic scale. The text is displayed centered on the scale. The label is often used to indicate the scale of the map, for example “1:50,000,000.”

scalar {0.5}

Graphic scale line width — Sets the line width of the displayed scale. The value is a scalar representing points, which is 0.5 by default.

vector

Graphic scale major tick locations — Sets the major tick locations for the graphic scale. The default values are chosen to give a reasonably sized scale. You can specify the locations of the tick marks by providing a vector of locations. These are usually equally spaced values as generated by start:step:end. The values are distances in the units of the Units property.

Cell array of character vectors

Graphic scale major tick labels — Sets the text labels associated with the major tick locations. By default, the labels are identical to the major tick locations. You can override these by providing a cell array of character vectors. There must be as many character vectors as tick locations.

scalar

Length of the major tick lines — Controls the length of the major tick lines. The length is a distance in the units of the Units property.

vector

Graphic scale minor tick locations — Sets the minor tick locations for the graphic scale. The default values are chosen to give a reasonably sized scale. You can specify the locations of the tick marks by providing a vector of locations. These are usually equally spaced values as generated by start:step:end. The values are distances in the units of the Units property.

character vectors

Graphic scale minor tick labels — Sets the text labels associated with the minor tick locations. By default, the label is identical to the last minor tick location. You can override this by providing a character vector label.

scalar

Length of the minor tick lines — Controls the length of the minor tick lines. The length is a distance in the units of the Units property.

{ruler} | lines | patches

Style of the graphic scale — Selects among three different kinds of graphic scale displays. The default ruler style looks like n axes' x-axis. The lines style has three horizontal lines across the tick marks. This type of graphic scale is often used on maps from the U.S. Geological Survey. The patches style has alternating black and white rectangles in place of lines and tick marks.

{up} | down

Direction of the tick marks and text — Controls the direction in which the tick marks and text labels are drawn. In the default up direction, the tick marks and text labels are placed above the baseline, which is placed at the location given in the XLoc property. In the down position, the tick marks and labels are drawn below the baseline.

{auto} | manual

Tick locations mode — Controls whether the tick locations and labels are computed automatically or are user-specified. Explicitly setting the tick labels or locations results in a 'manual' tick mode. Setting any of the tick labels or locations to an empty matrix resets the tick mode to 'auto'. Setting the tick mode to 'auto' clears any explicitly specified tick locations and labels, which are then replaced by default values.

scalar

X-location of the graphic scale — Controls the horizontal location of the graphic scale within the axes. The location is specified in the axes Cartesian projected coordinates. Use showaxes to make the Cartesian grid labels visible. You can also move the graphic scale by dragging the baseline with the mouse.

scalar

Y-location of the graphic scale — Controls the vertical location of the graphic scale within the axes. The location is specified in the axes Cartesian projected coordinates. Use showaxes to make the Cartesian grid labels visible. You can also move the graphic scale by dragging the baseline with the mouse.

scalar

Azimuth of scale computation — The scale of a map varies, within the projection, with geographic location and azimuth. This property controls the azimuth along which the scaling between geographic and projected coordinates is computed. The azimuth is given in the current angle units of the map axes. The default azimuth is 0.

scalar

Latitude of scale computation — The scale of a map varies, within the projection, with geographic location and azimuth. This property controls the geographic location at which the scaling between geographic and projected coordinates is computed. The latitude is given in the current angle units of the map axes. The default location is the center of the displayed map.

scalar

Longitude of scale computation — The scale of a map varies, within the projection, with geographic location and azimuth. This property controls the geographic location at which the scaling between geographic and projected coordinates is computed. The longitude is given in the current angle units of the map axes. The default location is the center of the displayed map.

Name or radius of reference sphere

Reference sphere name or radius — The radius property controls the scaling between angular and surface distances. radius can be one of the character vectors supported by km2deg, or it can be the (numerical) radius of the desired sphere in the same units as the Units property. The default is 'earth'.

(valid distance unit)

Surface distance units — Defines the distance units displayed in the graphic scale. Units can be any distance unit recognized by unitsratio. The distance character vector is also used in the last graphic scale text label.

(read-only)

Name of graphic scale elements — Contains the tag assigned to the graphic elements that compose the graphic scale. All elements of the graphic scale have hidden handles except the baseline. You do not normally need to access the elements directly.