Control existence of individual axes with matplotlibrc

Question

I have a matplotlibrc file:

axes.color_cycle    : 003A6F, BFBFBF, BFBFBF, BFBFBF, BFBFBF

..and I am using it to generate a generic plot:

import numpy as np
import matplotlib as mpl
from matplotlib import pyplot as plt

def makeplot(n=4):
    for i in range(n):
        plt.plot(np.sin(np.linspace(0, (i+1) * np.pi)),zorder=n-i)
    plt.title("Title")
    plt.ylim(-1.25,1.25)
    plt.show()

def apply_format(fmt, plot_function, params={}):
    with plt.style.context(fmt):
        plot_function(**params)


apply_format('./myformat.mplstyle',makeplot,{'n':3})

My questions are:

1. How do I specify in the matplotlibrc file to only show the left and lower axes lines?
2. How do I know what matplotlibrc options are available? (e.g. axes.color_cycle : b, r)

Answer 1

1) Not sure how to specify it in the matplotlibrc file. After scouring through the docs, it doesn't seem like it's possible (couldn't find any references to top/bottom ticks/axes). But if you'll settle for just the raw functionality of only showing the left/lower axes lines by removing the top/bottom axes lines, you can use tick_params().

def makeplot(n=4):
    for i in range(n):
        plt.plot(np.sin(np.linspace(0, (i+1) * np.pi)),zorder=n-i)
    plt.title("Title")
    plt.ylim(-1.25,1.25)
    plt.tick_params(axis='x', top='off')
    plt.tick_params(axis='y', right='off')
    plt.show()

2) See the documentation! Note that axes.color_cycle is deprecated (use axes.prop_cycle instead).