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Intro

Gnuplot.py is a Python package that interfaces to gnuplot, the popular open-source plotting program. It allows you to use gnuplot from within Python to plot arrays of data from memory, data files, or mathematical functions. If you use Python to perform computations or as `glue' for numerical programs, you can use this package to plot data on the fly as they are computed. And the combination with Python makes it is easy to automate things, including to create crude `animations' by plotting different datasets one after another.

Commands are communicated to gnuplot through a pipe and data either through the same pipe (as "inline" data) or through temporary files. It has been written and tested on a unix computer but is also reported to work on MS Windows and the Macintosh (please give me feedback!)

This package has an object-oriented design that allows the user flexibility to set plot options and to run multiple gnuplot sessions simultaneously. If you are more ambitious, it is not difficult to add entirely new types of plottable items by deriving from the `PlotItem' class.

The package includes a demonstration that can be run by typing `python demo.py'.

News

(26 Jan 2001) Gnuplot.py version 1.5 is out. The development of Gnuplot.py went through a lull during year 2000. One reason is that I don't use it in my new job. Another reason (I like to think) is that version 1.4 worked pretty well and didn't need much work. This month I've had some extra time so I incorporated several contributions from other users and made some improvements myself. I also moved the project to SourceForge because of their excellent facilities and to open up the development process. Version 1.5 has a few new features, a better source code organization, a distutils-based installation process, and better platform independence.

To read about changes introduced in earlier versions, read the NEWS.txt file in the distribution.

Documentation

The quickest way to learn how to use Gnuplot.py is to run the simple demonstration by typing `python demo.py', then to look at the demo.py file to see the commands that create the demo. One of the examples is probably similar to what you want to do.

HTML documentation is included in the doc/ directory of the distribution and is also available online. This documentation is extracted automatically from the package's docstrings using happydoc and is known to have some formatting problems.

Finally, you can look at the docstrings yourself by opening the file __init__.py in an editor.

To get good use out of Gnuplot.py, you will want to know something about gnuplot, for which a good source is the gnuplot help (run gnuplot then type `help', or read it online at this website). You might also want to check out Bernhard Reiter's gnuplot information page, which has many more links.

Installation

More detailed installation instructions are contained in README.txt.

Before you can use Gnuplot.py, you will need working versions of

If you want to run under MS Windows, make sure you are either using Python version 2.0 or later or that you have the Win32 extensions installed. Also make sure you have pgnuplot.exe (see the README.txt file for details).

To install Gnuplot.py:

  1. Download either Gnuplot-1.5.tar.gz or Gnuplot-1.5.zip.
  2. Gunzip and untar (or unzip) it, which will create a directory called ``Gnuplot-1.5''.
  3. Refer to README.txt in that directory for further instructions. Basically it should be enough to type python setup.py install.

You can also access the latest Gnuplot.py sources via CVS. Click here for more information.

Copyleft

Gnuplot.py is released under the GNU General Public License, which means that it can be freely copied and used, but that there are some restrictions on your rights to incorporate it into acommercial products. See the LICENCE file for more information. (If these restrictions are a problem for you, please contact me to discuss the issue.)

Credits

The Gnuplot.py package was written by Michael Haggerty.

The package was inspired by and partly derived from the Gnuplot.py module written by Konrad Hinsen. The oldplot.py module is roughly backwards compatible with Konrad's version.

Berthold Höllmann submitted a setup.py file to be used with distutils.

Craig Schardt and Francois Ladouceur contributed changes that enable Gnuplot.py to work under MS-Windows. Tony Ingraldi contributed changes for the Macintosh.

Jannie Hofmeyr submitted a fix for Windows under Python 2.0.

Written by Michael Haggerty (email <mhagger@alum.mit.edu>)