This is to announce the release of version 1.5 of Gnuplot.py. Gnuplot.py is a Python [1] package that allows you to create graphs from within Python using the gnuplot [2] plotting program. Gnuplot.py can be obtained from http://gnuplot-py.sourceforge.net/ Prerequisites (see footnotes): the Python interpreter [1] the Python Numeric module [3] the gnuplot program [2] Some ways this package can be used: 1. Interactive data processing: Use Python's excellent Numeric package to create and manipulate arrays of numbers, and use Gnuplot.py to visualize the results. 2. Web graphics: write CGI scripts in Python that use gnuplot to output plots in GIF format and return them to the client. 3. Glue for numerical applications (this is my favorite): wrap your C++/C/Fortran subroutines so that they are callable from Python, then you can perform numerical computations interactively from scripts or from the command line and use Gnuplot.py to plot the output on the fly. 4. Compute a series of datasets in Python and plot them one after the other using Gnuplot.py to produce a crude animation. New features in this version: + Added distutils support. + Broke up the module a bit for better maintainability. The most commonly-used facilities are still available through "import Gnuplot", but some specialized things have been moved to separate modules, in particular funcutils.py and PlotItems.py. + funcutils.tabulate_function() can be used to evaluate a function on a 1-D or 2-D grid of points (this replaces grid_function, which only worked with 2-D grids). + Added two helper functions, funcutils.compute_Data and funcutils.compute_GridData, which compute a function's values on a set of points and package the results into a PlotItem. + GridFunc is no longer an independent class; it is now a factory function that returns a GridData. GridFunc is deprecated in favor of funcutils.compute_GridData. + Changed set_option to work from a table, so that it doesn't need to be overloaded so often. + Implemented test_persist for each platform to make it easier for users to determine whether the `-persist' option is supported. + Added a prefer_persist option to serve as the default `persist' choice. + Following a suggestion by Jannie Hofmeyr, use "from os import popen" for Python 2.0 under Windows. I don't use Windows, so let me know how this works. + Added support for the `axes' and `smooth' options of the `plot' command. + Reworked the comment strings in an effort to make them work nicely with happydoc. Features already present in older versions: + Two and three-dimensional plots. + Plot data from memory, from a file, or from an expression. + Support for multiple simultaneous gnuplot sessions. + Can pass arbitrary commands to the gnuplot program. + Object oriented, extensible design with several built-in types of plot items. + Portable and easy to install (nothing to compile except on Windows). + Support for MS Windows, using the `pgnuplot.exe' program. + Support for sending data to gnuplot as `inline' or `binary' data. These are optimizations that also remove the need for temporary files. Temporary files are still the default. Footnotes: ---------- [1] Python <http://www.python.org> is an excellent object-oriented scripting/rapid development language that is also especially good at gluing programs together. [2] gnuplot <http://www.gnuplot.org/> is a free, popular, very portable plotting program with a command-line interface. It can make 2-d and 3-d plots and can output to myriad printers and graphics terminals. [3] The Numeric Python extension <http://numpy.sourceforge.net/> is a Python module that adds fast and convenient array manipulations to the Python language. -- Michael Haggerty mhagger@alum.mit.edu