[IPython-User] Javascript interaction with python objects in notebook

[Fernando Perez]

Hi Chris,

On Sat, Jan 7, 2012 at 9:13 AM, Chris Currivan <ccurrivan@gmail.com> wrote:
> I'm hoping to create something like an interactive plot with
> checkboxes for which lines to display. I can create the html objects
> from markdown or _repr_html_/display/publish_html. I can refer the
> click events to javascript defined elsewhere in a markdown cell,
> however that javascript can't return any information to the python
> code. Is is possible to use the notebook's internal interface to allow
> user javascript to send python calls to the kernel?

Sort of... You can put code like this in a markdown cell:

<script>IPython.notebook.kernel.execute("z=10")</script>

or in the repr_html of an object and then display it.  Just look at
'z' afterwards, and it will be 10.

However, we seem to have a very odd bug in that using these tricks and
saving, creates a file that then confuses the notebook on load.  Will
need to investigate...

> Is there an easy way to access matplotlib images in html/javascript in
> order to display them some way besides in a column below whatever was
> published last?

No, unfortunately not yet.

> Are there any examples of _repr_javascript_? I've tried a few
> variations of returning javascript code and none seem to execute. An
> example that didn't work:

I'm not sure the repr_javascript really works well yet.  But if you
change that to _repr_html_ keeping the code otherwise identical,
you'll get the alert to pop up.

Cheers,

f