Gnuplot 3d surface plot

Question

i have a text of x,y,z points with which i want to draw a 3d surface plot. The code that calculates these points, however, sometimes gives coordinates of zero value (0.000000000000000000e+00 to be precise). I have tried to ignore them using

set datafile missing '0.000000000000000000e+00'. 

The result is that the surface plot continues towards the (0,0,0) point. In the case of non-zero values, the plot appears to be working fine. Here is the gnuplot script i am currently using:

set title "Thermal efficiency versus maximum cycle pressure and expander inlet temperature"

set grid

set key top left
#set key off

set view 60,60

set xlabel "phigh [MPa]"
set ylabel "T3 [oC]"
set zlabel "nth [-]"

#set xrange[0.0:0.0]
#set yrange[0.0:0.0]
#set zrange[0.0:0.0]

set datafile missing '0.000000000000000000e+00'

set dgrid3d 100,100
#set hidden3d 

#set palette model CMY rgbformulae 7,5,15
set palette rgbformulae 33,13,10

#splot "performance_parameters.txt" using ($1/1000000.0):($2-273.15):($3) notitle with points palette pointsize 1 pointtype 7

splot "performance_parameters.txt" using ($1/1000000.0):($2-273.15):($3) notitle with lines palette  

#splot "performance_parameters.txt" using ($1/1000000.0):($2-273.15):($3) notitle with points palette pointsize 1 pointtype 7

I would like to know if there is another way to skip the zero-coordinates lines.

example of working plot

example of broken plot

Thank you in advance.

Answer 1

If I set datafile missing "0.000000000000000000e+00" it works fine for me (gnuplot 5.2.8). I guess that the string has to exactly match the value as a string in your data. Well, another approach would be to define a functions which returns NaN if the data value is 0 . So the left graph is including 0 and the other graphs do not include 0 .

Code:

### exclude data with 0 values
reset session

$Data <<EOD
1  1  0.1
1  2  0.3
1  3  0.2
2  1  0.5
2  2  1.3
2  3  1.2
0.000000000000000000e+00  0.000000000000000000e+00  0.000000000000000000e+00
3  2  0.9
3  3  0.7
EOD

set dgrid3d 20,20

myNonZero(col) = column(col) == 0 ? NaN : column(col)
unset colorbox

set multiplot layout 1,3

    splot $Data u 1:2:3 w l palette
    
    set datafile missing "0.000000000000000000e+00"
    splot $Data u 1:2:3 w l palette
    
    splot $Data u (myNonZero(1)):2:3 w l palette

unset multiplot
### end of code

Result: