LaTeX code for titles, labels,... with Plots.jl

General Usage
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1

I am using Plots.jl for making plots, but I would like to have my legend, title, labels,… in latex typesetting. With other libraries I know I can just use L"…", but when I run the following code:

using Plots
plot(0:2,0:2, xlab = L"x")

I get the following error:

LoadError: UndefVarError: @L_str not defined

Optimally I would also like the numbers on the x-and y-axis to be LaTeX, therefore I know I can use the package PGFPlots, but this is still being developped for Plots.jl.

2

You need using LatexStrings

3

This worked, thanks. Any idea how to set the numbers on the x/y axis to LaTeX?

4

try xticks?

5

Works like a charm, for completeness, my code is now:

using Plots
using LaTeXStrings

p = plot(0:2,0:2, xlab = L"x^2", xticks = ([0,1,2],[L"0", L"1", L"2"]))

and my problem has been solved completely.
Thanks!

6

Which backends does this work with?

7

I have it working on all that I have installed (gr, plotlyjs, pyplot)
EDIT: wait, it sometimes fails on plotlyjs, though it works most times. Peculiar.

8

Either plotly() and plotlyjs() backend doesn’t work for me
Maybe it has something to do with OS language?

847×471 18.2 KB

9

I am on OS X - I get the same occasionally, but most times it works with plotlyjs(). It is bit strange.

10

@mkborregaard The correct capitalization of the package name is LaTeXStrings.

11

Indeed it is, thanks for the dilligence.

12

Note: you don’t need the LaTeXStrings package in order to render LaTeX in Plots.jl - it just makes doing so more convenient. You can use LaTeX directly in Plots.jl by manually escaping all the $s, \s, etc.

14

Hello, how would you use LaTeX in Plots without the LaTeXStrings package ? label="${\bar{fitted}} prices$" or label=L"{\bar{fitted}} prices" would not work…

EDIT: Sorry… got it: label="\${\\overline{fitted}} \\thinspace prices\$")

15

Sorry for the reviving this thread again but I’m struggling to get this right:

using Plots, LaTeXStrings
plot(rand(100))
title!("This is an alpha: α")                   # produces ? for alpha
title!("This is an alpha: \$\\alpha\$")         # produces $ α$
title!(L"This is an alpha: α")                  # produces nothing
title!(L"This is an alpha: \alpha")             # produces nothing
title!(L"This is an alpha: $\alpha$")           # produces $ α$

I can’t seem to find a combination that plots the Latex symbol without also plotting the dollar signs - any help appreciated.

16

In my (small) experience, it depends on the backend. If you’re using the default for Plots.jl (GR.jl), LaTeX doesn’t work very well. It only works if you’re using a string that is all LaTeX, e.g.:

title!("\$\\alpha\$")

Otherwise you should currently use a different backend. For me, PyPlot.jl usually does its job with LaTeX.

17

…agree wrt. PyPlot, but on my computer (Win10), PyPlot doesn’t work in Juno – for some reason.

18

Hi Nils,

I found that for the title and gr() backend one has to use the latexstring() function directly instead of L"some latex code".

Below an example code

using Plots, LaTeXStrings

gr()

date = "07-08-2018"
titlestring = latexstring("\\mathrm{My\\, \\alpha\\, including\\, a\\, variable\\, date:\\,}", date)

plot(sin, (0:0.01:5*pi), dpi=300,
     title = titlestring,
     xlabel = L"\mathrm{My\, x-label\, (mJ/cm^{3})}",
     ylabel = L"\mathrm{\alpha (m/s)}")

Rob.

19

I’m having this issue too, and I’m getting extra dollar signs in all other backends : not sure if this is a juno issue, a backend issue or a plots issue…

20

I think the PyPlot backend is the only one that currently supports only part of the string being LaTeX, e.g. things like “foo \$\\infty\$”. In GR you get text with dollar signs.
As a workaround you can do e.g. “\$\\mathrm{foo}\,\\infty\$”.

21

Hi, I still have this problem. I just want to set my y label as “Unit is 10^3”, where the 10^3 should be latex symbol.

I’m using Juno with latest version of Julia, and none of above suggestions works.