Skip to main content
`Ctrl`+`K`

# MatView

display information about a matrix in a variety ways

## Synopsis

    #include "petscmat.h"
    PetscErrorCode MatView(Mat mat, PetscViewer viewer)

Collective on viewer

## Input Parameters

- mat - the matrix

- viewer - visualization context

## Options Database Keys

- -mat_view ::ascii_info - Prints info on matrix at conclusion of `MatAssemblyEnd()`

- -mat_view ::ascii_info_detail - Prints more detailed info

- -mat_view - Prints matrix in ASCII format

- -mat_view ::ascii_matlab - Prints matrix in MATLAB format

- -mat_view draw - PetscDraws nonzero structure of matrix, using `MatView()` and `PetscDrawOpenX()`.

- -display - Sets display name (default is host)

- -draw_pause - Sets number of seconds to pause after display

- -mat_view socket - Sends matrix to socket, can be accessed from MATLAB (see Users-Manual: ch_matlab for details)

- -viewer_socket_machine - -

- -viewer_socket_port - -

- -mat_view binary - save matrix to file in binary format

- -viewer_binary_filename - -

## Notes

The available visualization contexts include

- `PETSC_VIEWER_STDOUT_SELF` - for sequential matrices

- `PETSC_VIEWER_STDOUT_WORLD` - for parallel matrices created on `PETSC_COMM_WORLD`

- `PETSC_VIEWER_STDOUT_`(comm) - for matrices created on MPI communicator comm

- `PETSC_VIEWER_DRAW_WORLD` - graphical display of nonzero structure

The user can open alternative visualization contexts with

- `PetscViewerASCIIOpen()` - Outputs matrix to a specified file

- `PetscViewerBinaryOpen()` - Outputs matrix in binary to a specified file; corresponding input uses `MatLoad()`

- `PetscViewerDrawOpen()` - Outputs nonzero matrix structure to an X window display

- `PetscViewerSocketOpen()` - Outputs matrix to Socket viewer. Currently only the `MATSEQDENSE` and `MATAIJ` matrix types support the Socket viewer.

The user can call `PetscViewerPushFormat()` to specify the output format of ASCII printed objects (when using `PETSC_VIEWER_STDOUT_SELF`, `PETSC_VIEWER_STDOUT_WORLD` and `PetscViewerASCIIOpen()`). Available formats include

- `PETSC_VIEWER_DEFAULT` - default, prints matrix contents

- `PETSC_VIEWER_ASCII_MATLAB` - prints matrix contents in MATLAB format

- `PETSC_VIEWER_ASCII_DENSE` - prints entire matrix including zeros

- `PETSC_VIEWER_ASCII_COMMON` - prints matrix contents, using a sparse format common among all matrix types

- `PETSC_VIEWER_ASCII_IMPL` - prints matrix contents, using an implementation-specific format (which is in many cases the same as the default)

- `PETSC_VIEWER_ASCII_INFO` - prints basic information about the matrix size and structure (not the matrix entries)

- `PETSC_VIEWER_ASCII_INFO_DETAIL` - prints more detailed information about the matrix structure

The ASCII viewers are only recommended for small matrices on at most a moderate number of processes, the program will seemingly hang and take hours for larger matrices, for larger matrices one should use the binary format.

In the debugger you can do “call MatView(mat,0)” to display the matrix. (The same holds for any PETSc object viewer).

See the manual page for `MatLoad()` for the exact format of the binary file when the binary viewer is used.

See share/petsc/matlab/PetscBinaryRead.m for a MATLAB code that can read in the binary file when the binary viewer is used and lib/petsc/bin/PetscBinaryIO.py for loading them into Python.

One can use ‘-mat_view draw -draw_pause -1’ to pause the graphical display of matrix nonzero structure, and then use the following mouse functions.

      left mouse: zoom in
      middle mouse: zoom out
      right mouse: continue with the simulation

## See Also

Matrices, `Mat`, `PetscViewerPushFormat()`, `PetscViewerASCIIOpen()`, `PetscViewerDrawOpen()`, `PetscViewer`, `PetscViewerSocketOpen()`, `PetscViewerBinaryOpen()`, `MatLoad()`, `MatViewFromOptions()`

## Level

beginner

## Location

src/mat/interface/matrix.c

## Examples

src/ksp/ksp/tutorials/ex54f.F90
src/ksp/ksp/tutorials/ex54.c
src/ksp/ksp/tutorials/ex56.c
src/ksp/ksp/tutorials/ex84.c
src/ksp/ksp/tutorials/ex28.c
src/ksp/ksp/tutorials/ex4.c
src/dm/tutorials/ex14.c
src/ksp/ksp/tutorials/ex72.c
src/ksp/ksp/tutorials/ex55.c
src/ksp/ksp/tutorials/ex34.c

## Implementations

MatView_SchurCorrection() in src/ksp/pc/impls/hpddm/pchpddm.cxx
MatView_MPIAdj() in src/mat/impls/adj/mpi/mpiadj.c
MatView_MKL_CPARDISO() in src/mat/impls/aij/mpi/mkl_cpardiso/mkl_cpardiso.c
MatView_MPIAIJ() in src/mat/impls/aij/mpi/mpiaij.c
MatView_MUMPS() in src/mat/impls/aij/mpi/mumps/mumps.c
MatView_PaStiX() in src/mat/impls/aij/mpi/pastix/pastix.c
MatView_STRUMPACK() in src/mat/impls/aij/mpi/strumpack/strumpack.c
MatView_SuperLU_DIST() in src/mat/impls/aij/mpi/superlu_dist/superlu_dist.c
MatView_SeqAIJ() in src/mat/impls/aij/seq/aij.c
MatView_KLU() in src/mat/impls/aij/seq/klu/klu.c
MatView_MKL_PARDISO() in src/mat/impls/aij/seq/mkl_pardiso/mkl_pardiso.c
MatView_SuperLU() in src/mat/impls/aij/seq/superlu/superlu.c
MatView_UMFPACK() in src/mat/impls/aij/seq/umfpack/umfpack.c
MatView_MPIBAIJ() in src/mat/impls/baij/mpi/mpibaij.c
MatView_SeqBAIJ() in src/mat/impls/baij/seq/baij.c
MatView_BlockMat() in src/mat/impls/blockmat/seq/blockmat.c
MatView_ConstantDiagonal() in src/mat/impls/cdiagonal/cdiagonal.c
MatView_MPIDense() in src/mat/impls/dense/mpi/mpidense.c
MatView_SeqDense() in src/mat/impls/dense/seq/dense.c
MatView_Diagonal() in src/mat/impls/diagonal/diagonal.c
MatView_Elemental() in src/mat/impls/elemental/matelem.cxx
MatView_H2OPUS() in src/mat/impls/h2opus/cuda/math2opus.cu
MatView_Htool() in src/mat/impls/htool/htool.cxx
MatView_HYPRE() in src/mat/impls/hypre/mhypre.c
MatView_IS() in src/mat/impls/is/matis.c
MatView_KAIJ() in src/mat/impls/kaij/kaij.c
MatView_SeqMAIJ() in src/mat/impls/maij/maij.c
MatView_MPIMAIJ() in src/mat/impls/maij/maij.c
MatView_MFFD() in src/mat/impls/mffd/mffd.c
MatView_Nest() in src/mat/impls/nest/matnest.c
MatView_Preallocator() in src/mat/impls/preallocator/matpreallocator.c
MatView_MPISBAIJ() in src/mat/impls/sbaij/mpi/mpisbaij.c
MatView_CHOLMOD() in src/mat/impls/sbaij/seq/cholmod/sbaijcholmod.c
MatView_SeqSBAIJ() in src/mat/impls/sbaij/seq/sbaij.c
MatView_ScaLAPACK() in src/mat/impls/scalapack/matscalapack.c
MatView_MPISELL() in src/mat/impls/sell/mpi/mpisell.c
MatView_SeqSELL() in src/mat/impls/sell/seq/sell.c

Index of all Mat routines
Table of Contents for all manual pages
Index of all manual pages