python + igraph "plotting not available"

Question

I installed python-igraph 0.5.4 and igraph 0.5.4 (also tested 0.6) from source on a RHEL machine. All is fine except when I try to plot I get.

"TypeError: plotting not available"

There were no errors or warnings in the configure or install stages.

What do I need to install on linux to get plotting to work? I don't have root so will need to install it from source.

Answer 1

I had the same problem on my MacBook so I wanted to share my solution.

I tried to install pycairo, py2cairo. The installation seemed to be okay but then:

1. I could not import pycairo
2. igraph's plot would not work.

The following solved the igraph plotting issue:

sudo pip install cairocffi 

or just

pip install cairocffi 

So instead of pycairo I used cairocffi and this did the trick.

Answer 2

igraph uses the Cairo library for plotting, so you will need Cairo and its Python interface. Chances are that Cairo is already installed on your machine (look for files named libcairo* in /usr/lib and /usr/lib64), so you just need the Python interface of Cairo.

There is one catch, though. In order to compile the Python interface of Cairo, you will need Cairo's header files, which might or might not be present on your system. If they are not installed, you can download Cairo's source and get the include files from there.