[C#] Plotly.NET.CSharp Roadmap

[kMutagene]

This issue tracks the roadmap for the native C# package Plotly.NET.CSharp

Plans on how to design and develop the C# API have been laid out and tracked in #285 and #322.

The general roadmap implementation-wise is the following:

• 1. C# bindings for the high-level Chart construction API ([C#] C# bindings progress #296), one binding per chart at first (no overloads)
• 2. C# GenericChart Extension methods (this covers more or less all styling functions). Once these are finished, the F# extension methods for fluent interface can be removed.
• 3. C# bindings for Object abstractions (TraceObjects, LayoutObjects, etc.) this might be a bit tricky

[kMutagene]

Please update us, I ask ChatGPT to provide me useful links for Plotly.NET C# notebook examples.

Please take a closer look on ChatGPT and it's limitations, especially regarding the years of origin of it's training dataset and compare that to the year the C# bindings lib was released.

The only one that works are in the unit tests, which are limiting in scope

Plotly.NET.CSharp is already released on nuget. Any chart you create with it works in a notebook. If you cannot give me links to notebooks "not working" i cannot help you further.

This is an open source project. If you need C# notebook samples, there is no one stopping you from contributing.

That being said, for a direct pointer at some C# notebooks that use Plotly.NET.CSharp, take a look at the ML.NET sample books: https://github.com/dotnet/csharp-notebooks/tree/main/machine-learning

[kMutagene]

Nothing here talks about ==> Plotly.NET.CSharp

Please read the title of this very issue you just posted on.

[kMutagene]

15. 11 are closed.

[kMutagene]

After going through many issues here, I started to piece together, what will work and what will not work.

If that is the case, feel free to contribute a notebook that contains the things that work.

Am I wrong to assume this project [https://plotly.com/csharp/] is not related to this?

That site uses the base library Plotly.NET. Plotly.NET.CSharp is a native C# API on top of that. You can still use base Plotly.NET in C#, but the native bindings are idiomatic C#. All of this information is contained in both the Readme and Docs of this library.

[kMutagene]

In general however i can see that confusion is coming from the docs on plotly.com being old. See for example #356

[zyzhu]

It is indeed a problem for newbies who had experience in Plotly before. Their first stop shall be the official doc from Plotly, not searching prior issues here on GitHub. It is just a big obstacle for onboarding .Net users of Plotly.

Hope the official doc architecture at Plotly can be improved. Otherwise, the capital and time invested in .Net adoption of Plotly might be wasted. @jackparmer. It is like a last-mile problem to me.

[zyzhu]

I agree about the notebook. Microsoft's doc team shall consider contributing time to add more C# notebooks. F# community has coped with a decade of using C# only samples and docs to work around edgy issues in F#.

The F# community is small and engaging. But you cannot expect to put too much extra burden for them to add more C# resources. It needs broader help from the C# community. though they are under the same umbrella of .Net.

What I'm talking about is the investment from Plotly in this library. The official document on its website is still using a preview package and not showing examples of using Plotly.NET.CSharp yet. That is a pity as the engagement is missing the last piece to complete the picture.

[zyzhu]

not showing examples of using Plotly.NET.CSharp yet.

Without digging further, I thought Plotly.NET is strictly F#

That’s such a weird comment TBH. The name .Net means it’s for all languages under .Net. Following your logic, F# community should consider 99% of .Net libraries are strictly C# simply because the examples or docs are in C#?

[kMutagene]

I am investigating how to update the docs on the official page and moving completely to those docs eventually, including C# versions of the samples.

However, i still want to comment on your general attitude here @GeorgeS2019.

Comments like this

not showing examples of using Plotly.NET.CSharp yet.

Without digging further, I thought Plotly.NET is strictly F#

this

In short, the pieces of information NEEDED for a QUICK Start in c# REMAINS missing

and this

There are ONLY 4 issues labelled with csharp. It is like finding a needle in an ocean!

In combination with repeatedly ignoring me asking for further information or contributions reflect a certain demanding attitude i find rather reprehensive to show in an open source project that is maintained and provided to you completely free of charge. Just note that i investigate this issue despite this attitude, not because of it. Please rethink the way you interact with OSS maintainers in the future.