plotting vertical bars instead of points, plot_date
<p>I want to plot vertical bars instead of points.  The actual data I have are irregularly spaced, so this will help visualize gaps more easily.
When I try to plot it, the best I can do are points, which don't increase in size as you zoom in!</p>

<pre><code>import matplotlib
from matplotlib import pyplot as plt
import datetime

XX = [datetime.date.today()+datetime.timedelta(x) for x in range(10)]
YY = range(10)
plt.plot_date(XX,YY,'o')
</code></pre>

<p><a href="http://i.stack.imgur.com/lYheA.png" rel="nofollow"><img src="http://i.stack.imgur.com/lYheA.png" alt="enter image description here"></a></p>

<p><a href="http://i.stack.imgur.com/cGna8.png" rel="nofollow"><img src="http://i.stack.imgur.com/cGna8.png" alt="enter image description here"></a></p>

<p>Any ideas on how I can make taller/bigger (but not wider!) points?</p>

<p>You can use <a href="http://matplotlib.org/api/pyplot_api.html#matplotlib.pyplot.vlines" rel="nofollow"><code>ax.vlines</code></a> to plot a collection of vertical lines. </p>

<p>You can adjust <code>ymin</code> and <code>ymax</code> to suit your data.</p>

<pre><code>import matplotlib
from matplotlib import pyplot as plt
import datetime

XX = [datetime.date.today()+datetime.timedelta(x) for x in range(10)]

plt.vlines(XX, ymin=0, ymax=1, linewidth=5)

plt.show()
</code></pre>

<p><a href="http://i.stack.imgur.com/fLkq1.png" rel="nofollow"><img src="http://i.stack.imgur.com/fLkq1.png" alt="enter image description here"></a></p>

python date matplotlib