OxyPlot.Fluent

An unofficial extension library for OxyPlot to create plots using a fluent API.

⚠ This library is still in development ⚠

The aim is not to cover all of OxyPlot's functionality with the API, there are too many different options and configurations possible. I'm purely aiming to eliminate some of the boilerplate/extra work that can go along with generating plots especially when testing a proof of concept.

This started off when I needed to convert some legacy code from MATLAB to .NET. In MATLAB I could just call plot(x, y) but I couldn't find anything slightly similar for .NET... so I decided to build something.

For a flavour of what the aim is, take a look at the first test sample below

[STAThread]
private static void Main()
{
    Window window = Figure.Configure()
        .SetTitle("A sample figure")
        .WithPlot(p => p
            .SetTitle("Sample Plot")
            .WithLine(GetData(), s => s
                .SetTitle("Weird Data")
                .WithMarker(m => m
                    .SetType(MarkerType.Circle)
                    .SetFill(OxyColors.Transparent)
                    .SetStroke(OxyColors.Blue)
                    .SetStrokeThickness(2))
                .WithLine(l => l
                    .SetStyle(LineStyle.Dot)
                    .SetColour(OxyColors.DarkRed)))
            .WithLegend()
            .WithXAxis(a=>a
                .SetTitle("X Data"))
            .WithYAxis(a => a
                .SetTitle("(values)")
                .SetTickStyle(TickStyle.None)))
        .Build()
        .AsWindow();

    window.ShowDialog();
}

private static IEnumerable<DataPoint> GetData()
{
    yield return new DataPoint(0, 0);
    yield return new DataPoint(4, 3);
    yield return new DataPoint(6, 6);
    yield return new DataPoint(7.4, 3);
    yield return new DataPoint(8, 2);
}

The above sample produces something like this (using WPF on Windows 10) with no extra classes or code involved involved:

Prefixes / Verbs

All extension methods for configuring the figure/plot use a restricted set of prefixes, by using a restricted set we can give each one a specific meaning and it makes it easier to filter down to the methods you're interested in using your favourite IDE.

Prefix	Example	Usage
With	WithLegend()	Informs the configurator that the named sub-level should be included and provides an optional Action<T> to configure the sub-level
Without	WithoutLegend()	Informs the configurator that the named sub-level should not be included
Set	SetTitle()	Sets a property on the current level
Unset	UnsetTitle()	Informs the configurator that the property on the current level should not be included
Use	UsePlotGrid()	Sets one or more properties indirectly (use if setting multiple values or if the method sets a property to only one possible value like UseSecondaryYAxis())

Configuration Behaviour

Configurators can exist in 3 states:

• None - Neither a With nor Without statement has been made, if the Configure() method is invoked the configurator should not change the state of the target
• Include - A With statement has been invoked to indicate that this configurator should apply any of it's properties that are in a Set state and should invoke all child configurators when Configure() is invoked
• Exclude - A Without statement has been invoked meaning that the configurator should configure the plot item to be hidden or removed (this state is not valid for all configurators because some items like Series are controlled by another configurator, in this example plot, this may cause an exception)

Configurator properties are bi-state, they can be Set or Unset. This was previously handled by using null for the unset state but it wasn't possible to determine if a reference type property (e.g. string) had been explicitly set to null or was just in it's initial state.