Generating matplotlib graphs without a running X server

Question

Matplotlib seems to require the  DISPLAY environment variable which means a running X server Some web hosting services do not allow a running X server session Is there a way to generate graphs using matplotlib without a running X server    username hostname     python2 6 Python 2 6 5  r265 79063  Nov 23 2010  02 02 03   GCC 4 1 2 20080704  Red Hat 4 1 2-48   on linux2 Type  help    copyright    credits  or  license  for more information   gt  gt  gt  import matplotlib pyplot as plt  gt  gt  gt  fig   plt figure   Traceback  most recent call last     File   lt stdin gt    line 1  in  lt module gt    File   home username lib python2 6 matplotlib-1 0 1-py2 6-linux-i686 egg matplotlib pyplot py   line 270  in figure       kwargs    File   home username lib python2 6 matplotlib-1 0 1-py2 6-linux-i686 egg matplotlib backends backend tkagg py   line 80  in new figure manager     window   Tk Tk     File   usr local lib python2 6 lib-tk Tkinter py   line 1643  in   init       self tk    tkinter create screenName  baseName  className  interactive  wantobjects  useTk  sync  use   tkinter TclError  no display name and no  DISPLAY environment variable  gt  gt  gt

User · Answer

You need to use the matplotlib API directly rather than going through the pylab interface. There's a good example here:

http://www.dalkescientific.com/writings/diary/archive/2005/04/23/matplotlib_without_gui.html

User · Answer

Neil s answer is one  perfectly valid   way of doing it  but you can also simply call matplotlib use  Agg   before importing matplotlib pyplot  and then continue as normal     E g   import matplotlib as mpl mpl use  Agg   import matplotlib pyplot as plt  fig   plt figure   ax   fig add subplot 111  ax plot range 10   fig savefig  temp png     You don t have to use the Agg backend  as well   The pdf  ps  svg  agg  cairo  and gdk backends can all be used without an X-server   However  only the Agg backend will be built by default  I think    so there s a good chance that the other backends may not be enabled on your particular install   Alternately  you can just set the backend parameter in your  matplotlibrc file to automatically have matplotlib pyplot use the given renderer

[python] Generating matplotlib graphs without a running X server

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