title: Plot very small values with matplotlib in jupyter
body: <p>I am trying to plot some extremely small values with matplotlib in jupyter notebook (on a macbook pro). However, regardless if I set the y-axis limits, all I get is a flat line. What I am after is something like the example (png) below with regard to y-axis notation. I also tried the same example outside of jupyter and I still get the same results. Here's the code <a href="https://stackoverflow.com/questions/40328457/plot-extremely-small-values-in-matplotlib/40328517#40328517">suggested by Andrew Walker</a> on <a href="https://stackoverflow.com/questions/40328457/plot-extremely-small-values-in-matplotlib">my previous question</a>:</p>
  
  <pre><code>%matplotlib inline
  import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
  import numpy as np
  
  fig = plt.figure(figsize=(13,6))
  ax = fig.add_subplot(111)
  plt.hold(True)
  
  
  xs = np.linspace(0, 1, 101)
  ys = 1e-300 * np.exp(-(xs-0.5)**2/0.01)
  
  ax.plot(xs, ys, marker='.')
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Here's what I get:</p>
  
  <p><a href="https://i.stack.imgur.com/IPuZw.png" rel="nofollow noreferrer"><img src="https://i.stack.imgur.com/IPuZw.png" alt="enter image description here"></a></p>
  
  <p>And here's what I'm after:</p>
  
  <p><a href="https://i.stack.imgur.com/rUO52.png" rel="nofollow noreferrer"><img src="https://i.stack.imgur.com/rUO52.png" alt="enter image description here"></a></p>