Re: [Matplotlib-users] [matplotlib-devel] backends

[Christopher B. <Chr...@no...>]

John Hunter wrote:
>>>>>> "Christopher" == Christopher Barker <Chr...@no...> writes:
>     Christopher> Just as a note, if you have Cairo, you have PS, PDF,
>     Christopher> SVG, raster, and, indeed, native draw-to-the-screen
>     Christopher> functionality.
> 
> Last I checked if I recall correctly, about a year ago, the PS backend
> merely dumped a raster image and didn't do real vector graphics.  Has
> this changed?

There has been a LOT of work on Cairo in the last year, including the PS 
back-end. I'm just a lurker at this point, so I don't know how robust it 
is, but it supports vector operations for at least the common stuff. 
Here's part of a note posted in April to the mailing list:

"""
Is the output using image fallbacks in a case where you think it
shouldn't, (that is, your drawing doesn't have any fancy
translucence or something else that PostScript can't support
natively). In particular, I want to know if cairo is now using
fallbacks for something that was handled natively by the cairo 1.0
series.
"""

Which implies to me that it's working, and getting better.

My main thought about Cairo is that there is little point in duplicating 
the effort that the Cairo devs are doing, even if it doesn't support a 
feature or two that is needed. It's better to contribute to Cairo.

That is, unless, you are allergic to C (which I am mildly) or you have 
good reason to think that the whole framework of Cairo is inadequate.

-Chris





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Christopher Barker, Ph.D.
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Chr...@no...