On Thursday 20 November 2008 06:43:48 am Robin wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I think matplotlib is a terrific tool, and it is a major component of
> the open source toolset that has allowed me to stop using Matlab.
>
> But, whenever it comes to producing publication plots, there are a few
> things I always find challenging - and I'm wondering if I'm doing
> things wrong.
>
> First, what backend do people recommend for use on OS X? At the moment
> I am using TkAgg. But is there any backend that will behave as a
> proper OS X application ie allow window switching with cmd-`, maybe
> allow use of the maximise button etc.?
>
> When producing publication size plots - ie 3x3 in or smaller (that
> usually appear very small in the interactive window) there is an
> annoying behaviour where any mouse over the graph seems to resize it -
> the plot jumps around in size as I move the mouse over it. This is
> mainly annoying because it means when producing a batch of plots for
> later use, I have to be very careful not to mouse over, since once I
> do that, I can no longer be sure it will return to the same size, so
> the final set of images would have different sizes. If I accidently
> mouse over I have to go back and recreate the plot. Is this a property
> of the backend I am using?
I think I know what causes this, I saw something similar in the Qt backends a
while back. When the mouse cursor enters the axes, the coordinates of the
cursor are reported in the statusbar/toolbar. The backend needs to be
configured so this text widget would rather run off the end of the window than
resize the window. I don't know how this is done in Tk, I've never worked with
that GUI library.
> Again, when working with small sizes, the procedure for chaning the
> size of the figure is quite involved. As well as the standard problem
> of making sure the text fits, nothing overlaps the image etc.
> matplotlib doesn't seem to position the axes correctly in the figure -
> the labels are usually cut off. So I have to manually experiment with
> ax.set_position() by trial and error until I find a solution that
> looks OK - but of course if I later change the size of the figure I
> have to repeat this procedure. Is there an easier way to do this?
You can use the subplot_adjust button on the toolbar for some degree of
customization. But in general, it can be a somewhat time consuming to get the
layout just right. I think it would be difficult for mpl to determine what the
appropriate axes position should be given a certain figure and text size.
Darren
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