ENH : make container broadcast {get,set}_* functions

tacaswell · tacaswell · commit f28c7c7e769f · 2014-12-22T18:39:42.000-08:00
This uses magic in the `__getattribute__` method which _works_ but
does not play nice with IDE's,  documentation, or tab-complete.

Some Artist properties we don't want to broadcast, like
the label.
diff --git a/lib/matplotlib/container.py b/lib/matplotlib/container.py
@@ -10,6 +10,7 @@ class Container(tuple, Artist):
     """
     Base class for containers.
     """
+    _no_broadcast = ['label', ]
 
     def __repr__(self):
         return "<Container object of %d artists>" % (len(self))
@@ -18,7 +19,9 @@ def __new__(cls, *kl, **kwargs):
         return tuple.__new__(cls, kl[0])
 
     def __init__(self, kl, label=None, **kwargs):
+        # set up the artist details
         Artist.__init__(self, **kwargs)
+        # for some reason we special case label
         self.set_label(label=label)
 
     def remove(self):
@@ -31,6 +34,23 @@ def remove(self):
     def get_children(self):
         return list(cbook.flatten(self))
 
+    def __getattribute__(self, key):
+
+        # broadcast set_* and get_* methods across members
+        # except for these explicitly not.
+        if (('set' in key or 'get' in key) and
+              all(k not in key for k in self._no_broadcast)):
+
+            def inner(*args, **kwargs):
+                return [getattr(a, key)(*args, **kwargs)
+                        for a in self]
+            inner.__name__ = key
+            doc = getattr(self[0], key).__doc__
+            inner.__doc__ = doc
+            return inner
+        else:
+            return super(Container, self).__getattribute__(key)
+
     def draw(self, renderer, *args, **kwargs):
         # just broadcast the draw down to children
         for a in self:
