set axis limits in loglog plot with matplotlib

Question

How do I create space around the points I've plotted with matplotlib?

For example, in this plot, the bottom left point is cutoff by the axis, but I would like a little more space between the point and the axis.

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
x = [2**i for i in xrange(4,14)]
y = [i**2 for i in x]
plt.loglog(x,y,'ro',basex=2,basey=2)
plt.xlim([0, 2**14]) # <--- this line does nothing
plt.show()

In interactive mode, the xlim line returns (16.0, 16384), the old values instead of the new values I'm trying to set.

Answer 1

Zero can not be plotted on a loglog graph (log(0) = -inf). It is silently failing because it can not use 0 as a limit.

Try plt.xlim([1,2**14]) instead.

Answer 2

If you are looking for a general way to handle this problem and want to automatically adjust the limits of your plot (even without knowing anything of your data), you can also write a snippet inspired by this answer to a similar question.

Note that you will have to tweak the code a little bit and change it so it also do the job for the y axis.