freetype is a font rasterization
library used by matplotlib which supports TrueType, Type 1, and
The Gimp Drawing Kit for GTK+
The GIMP Toolkit (GTK) graphical user interface library
The Joint Photographic Experts Group (JPEG) compression method and
file format for photographic images
numpy is the standard numerical
array library for python, the successor to Numeric and numarray.
numpy provides fast operations for homogeneous data sets and
common mathematical operations like correlations, standard
deviation, fourier transforms, and convolutions.
Portable Network Graphics (PNG), a raster graphics format
that employs lossless data compression which is more suitable
for line art than the lossy jpg format. Unlike the gif format,
png is not encumbered by requirements for a patent license.
Postscript (PS) is a
vector graphics ASCII text language widely used in printers and
publishing. Postscript was developed by adobe systems and is
starting to show its age: for example is does not have an alpha
channel. PDF was designed in part as a next-generation document
format to replace postscript
pygtk provides python wrappers for
the GTK widgets library for use with the GTK or GTKAgg
backend. Widely used on linux, and is often packages as
pyqt provides python
wrappers for the Qt widgets library and is required by
the matplotlib QtAgg and Qt4Agg backends. Widely used on linux
and windows; many linux distributions package this as
‘python-qt3’ or ‘python-qt4’.
python is an object oriented interpreted
language widely used for scripting, application development, web
application servers, scientific computing and more.
pytz provides the Olson tz
database in Python. it allows accurate and cross platform
timezone calculations and solves the issue of ambiguous times at
the end of daylight savings
Qt is a cross-platform
application framework for desktop and embedded development.
Qt4 is the most recent
version of Qt cross-platform application framework for desktop
and embedded development.
Raster graphics, or bitmaps,
represent an image as an array of pixels which is resolution
dependent. Raster graphics are generally most practical for
photo-realistic images, but do not scale easily without loss of
The Scalable Vector Graphics format (SVG). An XML based vector
graphics format supported by many web browsers.
Tagged Image File Format (TIFF) is a
file format for storing images, including photographs and line
Tk is a graphical user interface for Tcl
and many other dynamic languages. It can produce rich, native
applications that run unchanged across Windows, Mac OS X, Linux
vector graphics use geometrical
primitives based upon mathematical equations to represent images
in computer graphics. Primitives can include points, lines,
curves, and shapes or polygons. Vector graphics are scalable,
which means that they can be resized without suffering from
issues related to inherent resolution like are seen in raster
graphics. Vector graphics are generally most practical for
typesetting and graphic design applications.
wxpython provides python wrappers
for the wxWidgets library for use with the WX and WXAgg
backends. Widely used on linux, OS-X and windows, it is often
packaged by linux distributions as ‘python-wxgtk’
WX is cross-platform GUI and
tools library for GTK, MS Windows, and MacOS. It uses native
widgets for each operating system, so applications will have the
look-and-feel that users on that operating system expect.