Nice!

Since this was basically broken earlier (for a while at least), I'm wondering if one should also adjust the behavior? To me, it seems like the text should maybe not be rotated?

A minor thing is that the z-label offset text doesn't look aligned with the label? Maybe there is some inconsistency in rotation anchor? (Which is then primarily a problem if the text is actually rotated, so we should probably decide which is the preferred approach first...)

Sorry about the additional questions. This clearly fixes a long standing issue, but since we more or less promise that it will be like this from now on, it is important to get it correct.

Hi @oscargus, thanks for the advice!

Regarding text rotation, the labels and offset text of each axis should align with the direction of the tick labels, instead of the X axis label rotating counterclockwise when the box rotates to the right as shown in the figure , is that correct?

For the second question, if Text.set_position() is used to set the the position of the anchor point, we can find the Z axis offset text is aligned with its label, with the label positioned at the center of the edge points and the offset text positioned next to an edge point from the following code:

• calculation of the anchor point for the label
  

  matplotlib/lib/mpl_toolkits/mplot3d/axis3d.py

  Lines 361 to 375 in 060992a

  	lxyz = 0.5 * (edgep1 + edgep2)
  	# A rough estimate; points are ambiguous since 3D plots rotate
  	reltoinches = self.figure.dpi_scale_trans.inverted()
  	ax_inches = reltoinches.transform(self.axes.bbox.size)
  	ax_points_estimate = sum(72. * ax_inches)
  	deltas_per_point = 48 / ax_points_estimate
  	default_offset = 21.
  	labeldeltas = (
  	(self.labelpad + default_offset) * deltas_per_point * deltas)
  	axmask = [True, True, True]
  	axmask[index] = False
  	lxyz = _move_from_center(lxyz, centers, labeldeltas, axmask)
  	tlx, tly, tlz = proj3d.proj_transform(*lxyz, self.axes.M)
  	self.label.set_position((tlx, tly))

• calculation of the anchor point for the offset text
  

  matplotlib/lib/mpl_toolkits/mplot3d/axis3d.py

  Lines 386 to 398 in 060992a

  	# Which of the two edge points do we want to
  	# use for locating the offset text?
  	if juggled[2] == 2:
  	outeredgep = edgep1
  	outerindex = 0
  	else:
  	outeredgep = edgep2
  	outerindex = 1
  	pos = _move_from_center(outeredgep, centers, labeldeltas, axmask)
  	olx, oly, olz = proj3d.proj_transform(*pos, self.axes.M)
  	self.offsetText.set_text(self.major.formatter.get_offset())
  	self.offsetText.set_position((olx, oly))

I think that we can define ourselves what is correct since it has been broken for so long(?). So it probably a matter of opinion.

Looking at the animation it is not so clear what is the preferred behavior. I think that looks quite good with the current approach. The z-alignment issue doesn't seem like a problem in the animation either. I wonder if there is some drawing order problem so that it happens for a single image, but not for an animation?

@scottshambaugh any opinions as one of the persons working on the 3D stuff?

If nothing else, I'll try to clarify this on the dev-call on Thursday and then we hopefully can reach an agreement what the expected behavior is. (Feel free to join if you want to. Info on https://hackmd.io/Ya6IQSTjSBqJ7TCY6MxUQQ )

I implemented the update created by Rylie-W and can confirm that it solves the problem in the code I uploaded and also in the application I am developing. Thanks for the great work Rylie!!

Docs an how to rebase: https://matplotlib.org/stable/devel/development_workflow.html#rewriting-commit-history (notes from call)

Discussed on call. The orientation of the offset texts is a long standing feature so lets take the bug-fix of getting them visible and defer discussion of if the orientation should be changed or not to a later date.

Congrats @Rylie-W on your first merged PR, hope to hear from you again!