matplotlib hist() autocropping range

Question

I am trying to make a histgram over a specific range but the matplotlib.pyplot.hist() function keeps cropping the range to the bins with entries in them. A toy example:

import numpy as np
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt

x = np.random.uniform(-100,100,1000)

nbins = 100
xmin = -500
xmax = 500

fig = plt.figure(); 
ax = fig.add_subplot(1, 1, 1)
ax.hist(x, bins=nbins,range=[xmin,xmax])  
plt.show()

Gives a plot with a range [-100,100]. Why is the range not [-500,500] as specified?

(I am using the Enthought Canopy 1.4 and sorry but I do not have a high enough rep to post an image of the plot.)

Solution

Actually, it works if you specify with range an interval shorter than [-100, 100]. For example, this work :

import numpy as np
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt

x = np.random.uniform(-100, 100, 1000)
plt.hist(x, bins=30, range=(-50, 50))
plt.show()

If you want to plot the histogram on a range larger than [x.min(), x.max()] you can change xlim propertie of the plot.

import numpy as np
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt

x = np.random.uniform(-100, 100, 1000)
plt.hist(x, bins=30)
plt.xlim(-500, 500)
plt.show()

Comments

[Keith]

OK Great. Or in a more OO way I can use ax.hist(x, bins=nbins,range=[xmin,xmax]) ax.axis(xmin=xmin,xmax=xmax)

[Ger]

Yes. Or ax.set_xlim(xmin=xmin, xmax=xmax).