Re: [Matplotlib-users] numarray, numpy, numeric, numerix, scipy,...

[John H. <jdh...@ac...>]

>>>>> "John" == John Pye <joh...@st...> writes:

    John> I don't have one and I don't think it's good design for my
    John> software installer to go creating one for people as part of
    John> a larger software installation. I think that sniffing would
    John> be a better (complementary, not replacement) solution, so
    John> that whichever the user decides to install, it just works.

You have a few options.  You can set the rc parameters inside your
script, you do not need to change a system wide rc file

  from matplotlib import rcParams
  rcParams['numerix'] = 'numpy'
  #...now import matplotlib.numerix, pylab, etc...

You can also provide per directory configuration files.  Ie, you can
create a matplotlibrc file (http://matplotlib.sf.net/matplotlibrc) in
the same dir as your main-level script, and it will respect that one
so you need not worry about overriding a system rc file when you
install your software.

    John> For now I will select numpy. Is that the one that Matplotlib
    John> looks for first?

There are two issues here: build time configuration and run time
configuration.  We used to do neither, now at built time we try and
find one of numpy/numarray/Numeric (in that order) and then generate
an rc file with the found one as the default.

We could also do run time dynamic imports.  I'm of two minds here: the
more we try and do automatically, the harder it is to detect and fix
bugs and problems when they arise.  The setup is already pretty
complex, if we are automatically choosing numerix and backend
settings, I could see some difficulties in debugging problems.  But I
can see the advantages to it as well...

JDH