Re: [Matplotlib-users] ImportError: No module named _backend_gdk

[Paul I. <pi...@be...>]

discolemonade, on 2014-08-05 21:29,  wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> I'm using the GTKAgg backend and when I run "import matplotlib.pyplot as
> plt" in the Python shell, I get the   _backend_gdk error. I checked all the
> files in my backend and there is no _backend_gdk.py. In fact, there are no
> python modules that start with an underscore.

As a rule of thumb, modules that start with an underscore come
from a compiled C or C++ extension. In this case, the source
file in question lives in src/_backend_gdk.c of the matplotlib
directory.

> It seems that some files were not installed. Is there some kind
> of a gtk dependancy I need to install before installing
> matplotlib? If so, where can I get it? My matplot version is
> 1.3.1. 

Yes, you'll need GTK and its headers installed, something like 

  sudo apt-get install libgtk2.0-dev python-gtk2-dev 

should work on a Debian system, though you should probably just 

  sudo apt-get build-dep python-matplotlib

best,
-- 
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--------------.......J
Paul Ivanov
ipython and matplotlib core developer
http://pirsquared.org