API_CHANGES

API changes at 0.50

  * refactored Figure class so it is no longer backend dependent.
    FigureCanvasBackend takes over the backend specific duties of the
    Figure.  matplotlib.backend_bases.FigureBase moved to
    matplotlib.figure.Figure.

  * backends must implement FigureCanvasBackend (the thing that
    controls the figure and handles the events if any) and
    FigureManagerBackend (wraps the canvas and the window for matlab
    interface).  FigureCanvasBase implements a backend switching
    mechanism

  * Figure is now an Artist (like everything else in the figure) and
    is totally backend independent

API changes at 0.42

  * Refactoring AxisText to be backend independent.  Text drawing and
    get_window_extent functionality will be moved to the Renderer.

  * backend_bases.AxisTextBase is now text.Text module

  * All the erase and reset functionality removed frmo AxisText - not
    needed with double buffered drawing.  Ditto with state change.
    Text instances have a get_prop_tup method that returns a hashable
    tuple of text properties which you can use to see if text props
    have changed, eg by caching a font or layout instance in a dict
    with the prop tup as a key -- see RendererGTK.get_pango_layout in
    backend_gtk for an example.

  * Text._get_xy_display renamed Text.get_xy_display
  
  * Artist set_renderer and wash_brushes methods removed

  * Moved Legend class from matplotlib.axes into matplotlib.legend

  * Moved Tick, XTick, YTick, Axis, XAxis, YAxis from matplotlib.axes
    to matplotlib.axis

  * moved process_text_args to matplotlib.text

  * After getting Text handled in a backend independent fashion, the
    import process is much cleaner since there are no longer cyclic
    dependencies

  * matplotlib.matlab._get_current_fig_manager renamed to
    matplotlib.matlab.get_current_fig_manager to allow user access to
    the GUI window attribute, eg figManager.window for GTK and
    figManager.frame for wx
  

API changes at 0.40

- Artist
    * __init__ takes a DPI instance and a Bound2D instance which is
      the bounding box of the artist in display coords
    * get_window_extent returns a Bound2D instance
    * set_size is removed; replaced by bbox and dpi
    * the clip_gc method is removed.  Artists now clip themselves with
      their box
    * added _clipOn boolean attribute.  If True, gc clip to bbox.
    
- AxisTextBase
    * Initialized with a transx, transy which are Transform instances
    * set_drawing_area removed
    * get_left_right and get_top_bottom are replaced by get_window_extent

- Line2D Patches now take transx, transy
    * Initialized with a transx, transy which are Transform instances

- Patches
   * Initialized with a transx, transy which are Transform instances

- FigureBase attributes dpi is a DPI intance rather than scalar and
  new attribute bbox is a Bound2D in display coords, and I got rid of
  the left, width, height, etc... attributes.  These are now
  accessible as, for example, bbox.x.min is left, bbox.x.interval() is
  width, bbox.y.max is top, etc...

- GcfBase attribute pagesize renamed to figsize

- Axes
    * removed figbg attribute
    * added fig instance to __init__
    * resizing is handled by figure call to resize.
     
- Subplot
    * added fig instance to __init__

- Renderer methods for patches now take gcEdge and gcFace instances.
  gcFace=None takes the place of filled=False

- True and False symbols provided by cbook in a python2.3 compatible
  way

- new module transforms supplies Bound1D, Bound2D and Transform
  instances and more

- Changes to the matlab helpers API

  * _matlab_helpers.GcfBase is renamed by Gcf.  Backends no longer
    need to derive from this class.  Instead, they provide a factory
    function new_figure_manager(num, figsize, dpi).  The destroy
    method of the GcfDerived from the backends is moved to the derived
    FigureManager.

  * FigureManagerBase moved to backend_bases

  * Gcf.get_all_figwins renamed to Gcf.get_all_fig_managers

Jeremy:

  Make sure to self._reset = False in AxisTextWX._set_font.  This was
  something missing in my backend code.