gnuplot vs Matplotlib

python logging matplotlib gnuplot graphing
Ethan Heilman picture Ethan Heilman · May 26, 2009 · Viewed 53.5k times · Source

I've started on a project graphing Tomcat logs using gnuplot-py, specifically correlating particular requests with memory allocation and garbage collection. What is the collective wisdom on gnuplot-py vs Matplotlib for Python graphing. Are there better graphing libraries out there I haven't heard of?

My general considerations are:

  • While gnuplot has large amounts of documentation, gnuplot-py doesn't. How good is documentation community for Matplotlib?
  • Are there things which gnuplot can do, but gnuplot-py can't?
  • Does Matplotlib have better Python support?
  • Are there are big show stopping bugs in either? Annoyances?
  • Currently gnuplot is graphing 100,000's of points, I'm planning on scaling this up to millions. Should I expect problems? How well does Matplotlib handle this?
  • Ease of use, turnaround time for gnuplot vs Matplotlib?
  • How easy would it be to port existing gnuplot-py code to Matplotlib?

How would you approach this task?

Answer

Autoplectic picture Autoplectic · May 26, 2009
  • You can check matplotlib's documentation yourself. I find it quite comprehensive.
  • I have very little experience with gnuplot-py, so I can not say whether it can do all gnuplot can.
  • Matplotlib is written in and designed specifically for Python, so it fits very nicely with Python idioms and such.
  • Matplotlib is a mature project. NASA uses it for some stuff.
  • I've plotted tens of millions of points in Matplotlib, and it still looked beautiful and responded quickly.
  • Beyond the object-oriented way of using Matplotlib is the pylab interface, which makes plotting as easy as it is in MATLAB -- that is, very easy.
  • As for porting from gnuplot-py to matplotlib, I have no idea.

Related questions

Python matplotlib contour plot logarithmic color scale

I have problems with a contour-plot using logarithmic color scaling. I want to specify the levels by hand. Matplotlib, however, draws the color bar in a strange fashion -- the labels are not placed well and only one color appears. …

Read More
String formatting: % vs. .format vs. string literal

Python 2.6 introduced the str.format() method with a slightly different syntax from the existing % operator. Which is better and for what situations? Python 3.6 has now introduced another string formatting format of string literals (aka "f" strings) via the syntax f"…

Read More
python exception message capturing

import ftplib import urllib2 import os import logging logger = logging.getLogger('ftpuploader') hdlr = logging.FileHandler('ftplog.log') formatter = logging.Formatter('%(asctime)s %(levelname)s %(message)s') hdlr.setFormatter(formatter) logger.addHandler(hdlr) logger.setLevel(logging.INFO) FTPADDR = "some ftp …

Read More