Blockplotlib

Matplotlib-based library for the creation of block diagrams. Besides this core functionality, blockplotlib provides a workflow to include all kinds of matplotlib figures with the correct font size into latex documents. While latex is also often used to render text inside figures/block diagrams, blockplotlib (as matplotlib) depends not on latex.

The functionality of the library is limited to the features demonstrated in the examples but can be extended quite easily.

Examples

How to draw a simple control loop is illustrated with the example blockplotlib/examples/control_loop_one_dof.py.

control_loop_one_dof.pdf

A more complex example is the block diagram of the so-called hyperbolic observer canonical form: blockplotlib/examples/hyperbolic_ocf.py

hyperbolic_ocf.pdf

The inclusion of matplotlib figures with the correct font size into a latex document can be adapted from the example under blockplotlib/examples/tex_article. It basically relies on two measurements of the height of a string. One measurement is performed in the latex preamble and the other one in the respective matplotlib figure using a blockplotlib function.

More examples can be found under blockplotlib/examples/.

Installation

One way to use blockplotlib is to install it via pip (pip install blockplotlib). Another way to use it is to copy the file blockplotlib.py in the folder of the Python script from which it is to be imported.