How to generate a Cocoa-recognized plot using matplotlib in Python on OS X (Leopard preferably)
Question: I'm not sure exactly what is going on under the hood, but here is my setup,
example code, and problem:

## setup:

  * snow leopard (10.6.8)
  * Python 2.7.2 (provide by EPD 7.1-2)
  * iPython 0.11 (provided by EPD 7.1-2)
  * matplotlib (provided by EPD 7.1-2)

## example code:

    
    
    import numpy as np
    import pylab as pl
    x=np.random.normal(size=(1000,))
    pl.plot(x)
    

## problem:

I can't use the standard Mac OS X shorcuts to access the window generated by
the plot command.

For example, I can't `Command`-`Tab` to the window. Thus, if the window is
behind some other window, I need to _mouse_ over to it! `Command`-`W` doesn't
close it.

Obviously, this is unacceptable. It seems like perhaps running Lion instead of
Leopard might fix this, but i haven't upgraded yet. I feel like the problem
has something to do with iPython generating windows that aren't fully Cocoa-
aware in some sense, but I really know very little so I'm not particularly
confident in this hypothesis.

Thus, any ideas on how to either resolve or get around this issue would be
much appreciated.


Answer: From the description on the [iPython page](http://ipython.org/), it looks like
Python uses **Qt** to generate UI. This means that the windows it generates
are definitely not Cocoa windows and will not act like them.

There's not likely to be an easy solution to this issue.

