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{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"DiscussionForumPosting","headline":"Move away from set_ticklabels()","articleBody":"*This is a placeholder issue so that I don't forget about it. I will some time later implement a draft PR. However, feedback is already welcome.*\r\n\r\n### Problem statement\r\n\r\n`Axis.set_ticklabels()` (and the derived `Axes.set_x/yticklabels()`) are problematic as they change the text of existing ticks. This relies implicitly on ticks being set previously at adequate positions. Essentially `set_ticklabels()` can only be used reasonably if `set_ticks()` has been called before. We try to make users aware of this by a warning in https://matplotlib.org/3.3.3/api/_as_gen/matplotlib.axis.Axis.set_ticklabels.html.\r\n\r\n### Proposed fix\r\n\r\n1. Add a parameter `labels` to `Axis.set_ticks()` so that one can do\r\n   ~~~\r\n   ax.set_xticks([1, 2, 3], labels=['a', 'b', 'c'])\r\n   ~~~\r\n   instead of\r\n   ~~~\r\n   ax.set_xticks([1, 2, 3])\r\n   ax.set_xticklabels(['a', 'b', 'c'])\r\n   ~~~\r\n\r\n2. Discourage using `set_ticklabels()`. - I think it's too widely used, so that we cannot deprecate it.\r\n\r\n### Further comments\r\n\r\nThis should make `set_xticks()` more similar/equal to `pyplot.xticks()`, which already has the labels parameter.\r\n\r\nTo be sorted out:\r\n- whether we want to support labels only (set_ticks(labels=['a', 'b', 'c'])\r\n- the return value of `get_xicks()`, which only returns the values, whereas `pyplot.xticks()` without parameters returns `ticks, labels`. This is a somwhat annoying asymmetry, but probably has to be left as is.\r\n- some more details.","author":{"url":"https://github.com/timhoffm","@type":"Person","name":"timhoffm"},"datePublished":"2020-11-26T01:36:45.000Z","interactionStatistic":{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":"https://schema.org/CommentAction","userInteractionCount":6},"url":"https://github.com/19016/matplotlib/issues/19016"}