Can one set a default PlotTheme
globally?
While I recognize one can make lots of workarounds to sort of do this:
Go to
$UserBaseDirectory -> Kernel
, open theinit.m
and put$PlotTheme = Something
where it says (** User Mathematica initialization file **).For a notebook: Mark the input cell
$PlotTheme = Something
and make it an "Initialization Cell".
These just seem dodgey to me, just not satisfactory for a change in Mathematica (the introduction of PlotTheme
s) that affects every plot in every notebook I have developed.
It seems to me that PlotTheme
does not particularly differ in kind from the kind of Font styling settings Mathematica has available in the OptionInspector
.
Does a way exist to do this in OptionInspector
?
A response to some of the questions raised in @Mr._Wizard's answer as it might run beyond the size of a comment.
So are you complaining about the general design of Mathematica or do you feel that Plot Themes should be handled specially?
I didn't mean to seem to complain. I think the introduction of PlotTheme
provides powerful new functionality and control, very much in keeping with the functional design philosophy of Mathematica -- power at increasingly higher levels of abstraction.
I also think that PlotTheme
operates a the right level of abstraction as it can easily affect so much output.
Prior to PlotTheme's
introduction, Mathematica had (essentially) a hard coded default plot theme. One could always make local changes in plot formatting, but they all started from that default theme. In introducing PlotTheme
, Wolfram not only introduced the new (and better) functionality, but they did a second thing that does not make sense to me. They made a "design" decision (and I'd argue an arbitrary design decision) to reset the hardcoded (default) plot theme.
This arbitrary design decision has had broad ranging consequences for almost all the work I've done in Mathematica since version 2 and I'd wager a great many others' work as well.
Consider what PlotTheme
could do if available in OptionInspector
. I think the introduction of PlotTheme
, begs for inclusion in the OptionInspector
. Doesn't it make most sense, there? Following on from my original thoughts in the question, if I can reset the color of fonts that I use for something like comments in code from the OptionInspector
, without restarting Mathematica and it affects every notebook I subsequently open, why not a PlotTheme
setting to provide comparable affects?
This would also provide an easy way for one to make their own choices about a PlotTheme
at the same level in the application whereat Wolfram has controlled the current default setting.
This seems to me like a different kind of thing than the other system parameters you describe - maybe because it has affected so much of the work I have done in the past - but I defer to @Mr._Wizard's greater insight into Mathematica on this. Still, this may also raise the secondary question, what logically ought to get included as a setting in the OptionInspector
.
$PlotTheme
is failing you; is it primarily a matter of (in)convenience in editinginit.m
versus opening the Option Inspector? $\endgroup$language-design
tag as I think from your update and comment above it is appropriate. $\endgroup$