polt 0.5.0

Live data visualisation via Matplotlib

Polt

Live data visualisation via Matplotlib

polt is a Python package for live data visualisation via Matplotlib.

What can polt do?

Reading Numbers from STDIN

for i in `seq 1 100`;do echo $i;sleep $i;done | polt live

Reading CSV from STDIN

echo "a,b,c\n1,2,3\n3,4,5\n7,5,8\n" | while read line;do echo $line;sleep 1;done | polt add-source -p CsvParser live

Reading Live Data from Logfiles

Imagine you have a file data.txt where another process constantly writes lines of numbers into. polt can then use the common tail program to watch that data:

polt add-source -c "tail -fn0 data.txt" live

Further Possibilities

It is possible to split the data into subplots for

• quantity
• unit
• parser

An example from the documentation of splitting by unit:

See the help page polt live -h for further configuration options.

Configuration Files

polt can use configuration files (by default ~/.config/polt/polt.conf and .polt.conf in the current directory) to simplify invocation. It is also possible to read and save the current configuration with the polt config command.

Custom Data Parsers

It is easy to add custom data parsers. Just create a subclass of polt.parser.Parser and specify the import path via the polt add-source --parser option. See the help page polt add-source -h for more details.

Why on Earth is it called polt and not plot!?

I am a big fan of swapping syllables or characters around resulting in ridiculously-sounding words. polt is one of those words which I am generating quite frequently when typing quickly.

Installation

The polt package is best installed via pip. Run from anywhere:

python3 -m pip install --user polt

This downloads and installs the package from the Python Package Index.

You may also install polt from the repository root:

python3 -m pip install --user .

Translations

Currently, the following languages are available:

• English
• German

If you are interested in adding another language, just open a New Issue and we will get you going.

Documentation

Documentation of the polt package can be found here on GitLab.

Also, the command-line help page polt -h is your friend.