Re: [Matplotlib-users] Pgf Backend with Xelatex support

[Andreas H. <li...@hi...>]

>
> Hi,
>
> When creating figures to be included in Latex documents I encountered a
> few
> problems. In the end the text rendering just doesn't blend in well, one
> way
> or another. I found that the problems can be fixed by using Xelatex, which
> provides full unicode support and is able to use the installed fonts of
> your
> operating system.
>
> I wrote a new backend that uses the "pgf" latex package for drawing
> matplotlib figures. It is compatible with pdflatex, xelatex and lualatex.
> The pgf pictures can be included in latex documents or can be directly
> compiled to PDF by the backend, utilizing the benefits of Xelatex.
>
> The code for the backend and a script creating a test figure is on github:
> https://github.com/pwuertz/matplotlib-backend-pgf/
>
> A document that demonstrates the benefits of using pgf/xelatex is also
> there:
> https://github.com/pwuertz/matplotlib-backend-pgf/raw/master/demo/demo.pdf
>
> Although I think the pgf backend is very useful already and produces
> figures
> in publication quality (an overused expression ;) ), there are still some
> loose ends. Basically, everything I need works but I don't have the time
> anymore to figure out all the rest. Maybe someone is interested in
> improving
> this backend, possibly making it a real option for the masses? I wrote
> down
> all open questions I had in TODO comments within the code. To summarize
> them:
>
> * The default font for the backend is the unicode variant of Computer
> Modern
> (CMU Serif), which might not be present on most users' systems. If you
> don't
> want to install/use it, you can just specify another (see test script). I
> could as well check for the fonts specified in the rc parameters but these
> just do fit in Latex documents.
>
> * When printing pgf commands, the actual font depends on the latex
> environment you are embedding the figure in. Matplotlib only needs a font
> for calculating the text positions and for direct PDF output.
>
> * I'm not sure how certain draw methods of the renderer should behave due
> to
> lack of documentation.
>
> * Some text properties like switching font families or making the text
> italic/bold are ignored since I did not need them.
>
> * Backends like svg or pdf are able to display the document upon show(). I
> don't know how this is achieved without creating a graphical user
> interface
> myself. The other backends don't implement it.
>
> * The method of obtaining the metrics of text elements is pretty cool I
> think (XelatexManager), but it breaks easily since there is no way of
> defining a timeout for reading the output of a subprocesses that keeps
> running during the figure creation process. Right now, if Latex doesn't
> understand a text-element the process stalls. An alternative is to run a
> new
> latex process for every single text element or start using threads.
>

Looks great! How do I use this with my currently installed matplotlib 1.1.0?

Cheers,
A.