matplotlib-users Mailing List for matplotlib

I'm concerned that at some point down the road, The Mathworks may not
like the fact that matplotlib uses the name matlab, which is
trademarked.  I think I'll rename the matlab interface to pylab.  In
some sense, this name is more appropriate any way, because I'd like to
incorporate the best features of IDL, gnuplot and python, while still
retaining and enhancing core matlab compatibility.  I emailed Travis,
who previously used pylab.sf.net before it became part of scipy, and
he didn't have a problem with our using this name.  And Fernando
already uses pylab as the option to ipython to make ipython support
matplotlib.

So my plan is to change the name of the matplotlib.matlab module to
matplotlib.pylab, but wanted propose this here first since this will
effect almost every script.  It should be an easy search and replace
operation, and I'll probably post a little python script to
recursively replace all matplotlib.matlab references in a given
directory with matplotlib.pylab, since I have a few directories myself
that will need to be renamed.

Comments or objections welcome.

JDH

>>>>> "Carol" == Carol Leger <car...@sr...> writes:

    Carol> I want to make a semi-transparent box around the text
    Carol> labels along the radial axis of a polar plot.  Is there a
    Carol> method that returns the coordinates of a box that encloses
    Carol> the text?

    Carol> I see that a text instance has a method called
    Carol> get_window_extent.  What does it return?  What would I use
    Carol> for the parameter 'renderer'?  Are there any examples
    Carol> showing how to use this?


The problem here is that there is no way to know the text size
(bounding box) until the renderer (backend) is known.  matplotlib
enforces a rigid separation between the "artists" (lines, texts,
things that go into a figure) and the things that draw them (renderer
/ backend) .  In most cases this presents no difficulties, but in the
case of text it does, since layout information is not available until
the figure is drawn, since that is when the backend/renderer is drawn.
So that is what the renderer is and the short answer is that it is not
available at the matlab interface level.

But I've been wanting to support the ability to put bounding boxes
around text instances and your post triggered the idea on how to do
this.  I added a new text property "bbox" which takes as a dictionary
of Rectangle properties 


    t = title('hi mom', bbox={'edgecolor':'k', 'facecolor':'r', 'alpha':0.5})


In addition to the rectangle properties, the bbox dict accepts an
additional property 'pad' which gives the padding around the text in
points.

I checked the changes into CVS - it usually takes the mirrors a few
hours to update.

If you get a snazzy screenshot of your polar plot after all these
customizations that would look nice on the web site, please send it my
way!

JDH

I want to make a semi-transparent box around the text labels along the 
radial axis of a polar plot.  Is there a method that returns the 
coordinates of a box that encloses the text?

I see that a text instance has a method called get_window_extent.  What 
does it return?  What would I use for the parameter 'renderer'?  Are 
there any examples showing how to use this?




-- 
Ms. Carol A. Leger
SRI International			Phone: (650) 859-4114
333 Ravenswood Avenue G-273
Menlo Park, CA 94025                    e-mail: le...@sr...

Hello!

> Perhaps you can be a little more specific about what you want to do.

I think that a 'picture' can help - in this case, I think fixed
fonts will really help understanding. I remember using some
command in Matlab to do this, but can't remember exactly what
it was, and I can't search the help because I uninstalled it.
What I need is, basically, this:


                            *| x
                   *         |
             *               |
         *                   |
       *                     |
      *                      |
      *                      |
y --------------------------+


>   plot(y, x)

That, and setting the x_lim inverted, worked as I wanted, thanks.

But one more thing: while I was searching for a specific command
to do that, I found something (but not much) about transforms, which
I couldn't exactly understand what they do and how they work, but
they might be handy in the near future. What are they exactly, and
how can they help?

---
José Alexandre Nalon
na...@te...

On Mon, 29 Nov 2004, Jos=E9 Alexandre Nalon apparently wrote:
> In a figure I'm generating, I need to plot a function rotated
> 90 degrees counter-clockwise, so that x-axis is vertical, and
> y-axis is horizontal (increasing from right to left). I searched
> the documentation and the examples and couldn't find how (what I
> tried didn't work). Probably there is a simple way to do that, if
> somebody can point that out, I would really appreciate. :)

Can you fill in your needs more precisely.
Why can you not just switch the order of
the sequences you provide to 'plot'
(perhaps in a loop is there are several)?

Cheers,
Alan Isaac

I just created a new low traffic mailing list that carries
announcements of interest to matplotlib users.  It can include new
releases, new documentation, projects that use matplotlib, tutorials,
etc.

  https://lists.sourceforge.net/mailman/listinfo/matplotlib-announce

I'll still always post announcements to this list, but if you just
want the announcements w/o the extra traffic in your inbox from the
users list, you may prefer to only subscribe to the announce list.

JDH

>>>>> "Jochen" == Jochen Voss <vo...@se...> writes:

    Jochen> Actually I think this is fixed in CVS, isn't it?

I think so.  In my cvs tree in setup.py, I have

if BUILD_GTKAGG:
    try:
        import gtk
    except ImportError:
        print 'GTKAgg requires pygtk'
        BUILD_GTKAGG=0
    except RuntimeError:
        print 'pygtk present but import failed'


If X is not present, they get the runtime error, and in this case GTK
will still build, right?

But you'll still need X to run the GTK backend....

JDH

>>>>> "Jos=E9" =3D=3D Jos=E9 Alexandre Nalon <na...@te...> writes:

    Jos=E9> Greetings!  In a figure I'm generating, I need to plot a
    Jos=E9> function rotated 90 degrees counter-clockwise, so that
    Jos=E9> x-axis is vertical, and y-axis is horizontal (increasing
    Jos=E9> from right to left). I searched the documentation and the
    Jos=E9> examples and couldn't find how (what I tried didn't
    Jos=E9> work). Probably there is a simple way to do that, if
    Jos=E9> somebody can point that out, I would really appreciate. :)

Perhaps you can be a little more specific about what you want to do.
For a "plot", all you need to do is reverse the x and y arguments
and place your xlabel and ylabel accordingly. =20

  plot(y, x)

I could probably give you more help if you describe what you need in
addition this.

For a bar chart, use barh.

For printing, some backends (eg postscript) support landscape mode

    savefig(fname, orientation=3D'landscape'):

JDH

Greetings!

In a figure I'm generating, I need to plot a function rotated
90 degrees counter-clockwise, so that x-axis is vertical, and
y-axis is horizontal (increasing from right to left). I searched
the documentation and the examples and couldn't find how (what I
tried didn't work). Probably there is a simple way to do that, if
somebody can point that out, I would really appreciate. :)

Thanks in advance

---
José Alexandre Nalon
na...@te...