[matplotlib-devel] Grace backend?

[Norbert N. <Nor...@gm...>]

Hi there,

has anybody thought about a Grace backend, yet? I've recently been using 
Grace for some plotting and was really surprised how the version 5.99 
has evolved over the past months. Not quite finished, but a huge step 
forward compared to the former versions of Grace.

For other tasks, I also have gotten to like the possibility of scripting 
plotting tasks in matplotlib. I have a number of scripts that I really 
don't want to dump completely.

Now my idea was: how about a matplotlib backend producing a .xgr file? 
Unlike the old .agr format, .xgr is now a XML based format describing a 
plot in Grace (without any scripting possibilities)

The structure of an .xgr file is not too different from the model that 
matplotlib uses, so the basic functionality should be rather simple to 
implement.

The main difficulty would probably be, that .xgr describes plots at a 
much higher level than the usual backends. The usual backend interface 
will therefore not work. I have no clear idea yet how the .xgr export 
could be incorporated in the easiest way.

B.t.w: I myself will most likely not be able to spend any serious time 
on this in the near future, so if anybody wants to look into it, I will 
not stand in the way.

Ciao,
Norbert