Default toolbar overlaps figure

[efiring]

Describe the issue

The default position of the toolbar is on the left, where it overlaps the figure. Especially when the constrained_layout=True keyword is used when creating the figure, this is highly undesirable.

Possible solutions or workarounds:

• Minimal fix: Change the default to anything other then "left"; I think that with the current design, "right" would be by far the best. It would minimize the likelihood of an overlap.
• The real fix: When the toolbar_position is on the left, position the figure to its right. Ideally, all toolbar positions should be in boxes that never overlap the figure box. With this scheme I suggest putting the default toolbar on the top or bottom, and flush left, to match all of the other matplotlib interactive backends.

Versions

 3.8.13 | packaged by conda-forge | (default, Mar 25 2022, 06:06:49)
[Clang 12.0.1 ]
ipympl version: 0.9.2
Selected Jupyter core packages...
IPython          : 8.5.0
ipykernel        : 6.16.0
ipywidgets       : 7.7.0
jupyter_client   : 7.3.5
jupyter_core     : 4.11.1
jupyter_server   : 1.23.1
jupyterlab       : 3.5.0
nbclient         : 0.6.8
nbconvert        : 7.0.0
nbformat         : 5.6.1
notebook         : 6.5.2
qtconsole        : 5.3.1
traitlets        : 5.4.0
Known nbextensions:
  config dir: /Users/efiring/.jupyter/nbconfig
    notebook section
      matplotlib/extension  enabled
      - Validating: problems found:
        - require?  X matplotlib/extension
  config dir: /Users/efiring/miniconda3/envs/py38/etc/jupyter/nbconfig
    notebook section
      jupyter-matplotlib/extension  enabled
      - Validating: OK
      jupyter-js-widgets/extension  enabled
      - Validating: OK
JupyterLab v3.5.0
/Users/efiring/miniconda3/envs/py38/share/jupyter/labextensions
        jupyterlab_pygments v0.2.2 enabled OK (python, jupyterlab_pygments)
        jupyter-matplotlib v0.11.2 enabled OK
        @jupyter-widgets/jupyterlab-manager v3.1.1 enabled OK (python, jupyterlab_widgets)

[efiring]

I'm puzzled: the example in the README.md, https://github.com/matplotlib/ipympl/blob/main/matplotlib.gif, behaves the way I want, with the toolbar on the left but not overlapping the figure boundary. Has the behavior gotten broken since that animated gif was made?

[martinRenou]

😅 Indeed the behavior changed since the README GIF was generated.

The decision was made to overlap the figure when we went for a "hide and show" toolbar. Though indeed it could be nice to be able to control this behavior.

[efiring]

As a data point from one person: I see no advantages whatsoever in "hide and show". It is simply distracting, and a step back from discoverability and what-you-see-is-what-you-get. I think that the old notebook backend provides a fine model of good behavior, very similar to all the other GUI backends. The toolbar is there, below the figure, when the figure is active; and there is a "close" button to freeze the figure, close it on the matplotlib side, and remove the toolbar.

I'm sorry I wasn't paying attention whenever the decision was made to add "hide-and-show". I hope its reversal can be considered. Surely it is not helping anyone's productivity, is it?

[martinRenou]

This behavior was introduced to increase the available space for the figure.

I'd be happy to help reviewing a PR that allows optionally putting the toolbar outside of the figure.

[ianhi]

I think this is undocumented (:cry: ) but the fade out is configurable via the fig.cavnas.toolbar_visible attribute.

Notably, like other things in ipympl there is no equivalent of rcparams wherein the user can configure this permanently.

[jklymak]

Is there any reason that the toolbar cannot go in the status gutter to the left of the figure? At least on my notebooks there is lots of extra space.