Stacking order of figures

Suppose I create three figures
for ni = 1:3
figure
plot(rand(7))
drawnow
end
These will be drawn with Figure 1 on the bottom, Figure 2 in the middle, and Figure 3 on top, remaining viewable at the end.
How can change the stacking order? Prior to 2014b, one could sort the Children of the root object numerically, but I can't figure out how to do it in 2014b.

Answers (1)

Maybe I am misunderstanding the question:
close all
for ni = 1:3
figure
plot(rand(7))
drawnow
end
uistack(2,'top')
uistack(1,'top')

4 Comments

You are not misunderstanding, but this tiny extension of your code does not correctly order the figures (in 2014b on latest Mac OS X):
rng('default')
NFIGURES = 4;
close all force
for nf = 1:NFIGURES
figure
plot(rand(7))
drawnow
end
for nf = NFIGURES-1:-1:1
uistack(nf,'top')
end
Bug?
FYI, how I did this formerly (and successfully) was
set(0,'Children',sort(get(0,'Children')));
Have you tried
set(0,'Children',sort(double(get(0,'Children'))));
Yes, that seems to work. Thanks!
men8th
men8th on 8 Feb 2023
Edited: men8th on 8 Feb 2023
An explicit version of the above command, which doesn't rely on casting a figure handle to double returning the figure number is:
set(groot,'Children',sort([get(groot,'Children').Number]))
This also uses groot to point to the graphics root object, rather than the magic number 0.
From reading the documentation, This will only find and re-order figures with visible handles. To work with all figures, you need to use findall.

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Find more on Creating, Deleting, and Querying Graphics Objects in Help Center and File Exchange

Asked:

on 18 Nov 2014

Edited:

on 8 Feb 2023

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