[Matplotlib-devel] Documentation

[Paul Hobson]

On Mon, Feb 12, 2018 at 5:56 PM, Chris Barker - NOAA Federal <
chris.barker at noaa.gov> wrote:

> Object Oriented seems to be a good demarcation,
>
>
> I don’t think so— writing OO code, that is defining your own classes,
> subclassing, etc. is non-beginner, but calling methods on existing objects
> is not: you can’t get very far in python without using the methods of the
> buil-ins: lists, dicts, strings....
>
> but since the suggested way of interacting with mpl is through the OO
>
>
> Which does mean calling methods on objects, but that’s about it.
>
>  they're all pyplot, but that seems to be the preferred intro-and I wonder
> if it'd be good for matplotlib to have more bridge documentation that
> doesn't just show how to do things both ways but explains why the OO way is
> better.
>
>
> Yup. And I don’t think pyplot is any easier for newbies—other than
> existing Matlab users — admittedly a big group.
>
> Also a proper simple but object oriented tutorial might help here.  Ben
> Root and Nicolas Rougier's  tutorials are in this direction.
>
>
> Yes!!
>
> I say introduce the OO interface, then have a “matplotlib for Matlab
> users” section to translate for them.
> .
>
> I'd love to get as many profiles as possible up front.
>
>
> Just now thought that “Matlab user” is a profile to keep
> In mind.
>
> Pretty basic self assessment questions: What's your fluency with Python?
> How long have you been using Python? How long have you been using
> Matplolib?
>
>
> What other languages/plotting libraries are you comfortable with?
>
> -CHB
>

I like where this discussion is going. If I could wave a magic wand, I set
up two parallel introductory tutorials:
1) for all new comers: show basic plotting and customization with the OO
interface
2) for new comers with MATLAB backgrounds:  show basic plotting and
customization with pyplot on the left and the OO interface on the right

-Paul
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