Hi,
The Mac OS X backend is entirely written in C (with some Objective-C elements
where necessary). AFAICT, this is the largest C/C++ code in matplotlib. This
backend was written from scratch without using Cython, SWIG, or Boost.Python.
From my experience, I would prefer to write such extensions in C directly
rather than relying on Cython, SWIG, or Boost.Python, because those approaches
would lead to another dependency (for developers at least), and requires
developers to learn how to code in them. Which may not be very hard, but we may
as well avoid that if possible.
I'd be happy to help out with the conversion of the other extensions from CXX
to C. I would need some help though to use github appropriately.
Best,
-Michiel.
--- On Thu, 11/29/12, Michael Droettboom wrote:
> From: Michael Droettboom
> Subject: [matplotlib-devel] Experiments in removing/replacing PyCXX
> To: "matplotlib-devel@lists.sourceforge.net"
>
> Date: Thursday, November 29, 2012, 11:59 AM
> Given the slow pace of development on
> PyCXX, I know it has been the
> desire of some here to remove our dependency on it.
>
> I thought a helpful starting point to evaluate the
> alternatives would be
> to restructure one of our extensions to not use PyCXX
> anymore. I've
> taken the PNG extension, which is reasonably straightforward
> in that it
> doesn't define any custom types, but does have some low
> level C-wrapping
> challenges, and separated out the Python-specific parts from
> the
> libpng-specific parts. The Python-specific parts are
> now written using
> the "raw" Python C/API. The other part still uses C++ (not
> C) and does
> throw exceptions, but doesn't use classes or templates or
> anything else
> that can be difficult to wrap. All of this is on my
> "no_cxx" branch.
>
> Now here's the challenge: can we do better than this using
> any of the
> available wrapping tools? Cython, SWIG, Boost.Python
> etc.? I've not had
> much luck with Cython for this kind of thing in the past,
> but I know it
> is popular. Perhaps someone with more Cython
> experience would want to
> take a crack at this and then we could have something
> concrete to compare...
>
> Cheers,
> Mike
>
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