Holoviews

**May 12, 2016**

A major release with a large number of new features including new data
interfaces for grid based data, major improvements for DynamicMaps and a
large number of bug fixes.

Features and improvements:

- Added a grid based data interface to explore n-dimensional gridded
data easily (PR
[\562](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/542)).
- Added data interface based on [iris
Cubes](http://scitools.org.uk/iris/docs/v1.9.2/index.html) (PR
[\624](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/624)).
- Added support for dynamic operations and overlaying of DynamicMaps
(PR [\588](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/588)).
- Added support for applying groupby operations to DynamicMaps (PR
[\667](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/667)).
- Added dimension value formatting in widgets (PR
[\562](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/issues/562)).
- Added support for indexing and slicing with a function (PR
[\619](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/619)).
- Improved throttling behavior on widgets (PR
[\596](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/596)).
- Major refactor of Matplotlib plotting classes to simplify
implementing new Element plots (PR
[\438](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/438)).
- Added Renderer.last_plot attribute to allow easily debugging or
modifying the last displayed plot (PR
[\538](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/538)).
- Added Bokeh QuadMeshPlot (PR
[\661](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/661)).

Bug fixes:

- Fixed overlaying of 3D Element types (PR
[\504](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/504)).
- Fix for Bokeh hovertools with dimensions with special characters (PR
[\524](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/524)).
- Fixed bugs in seaborn Distribution Element (PR
[\630](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/630)).
- Fix for inverted Raster.reduce method (PR
[\672](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/672)).
- Fixed Store.add_style_opts method (PR
[\587](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/587)).
- Fixed bug preventing simultaneous logx and logy plot options (PR
[\554](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/554)).

Backwards compatibility:

- Renamed `Columns` type to `Dataset` (PR
[\620](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/issues/620)).

**February 11, 2016**

A minor bugfix release to patch a number of small but important issues.

Fixes and improvements:

- Added a [DynamicMap
Tutorial](http://holoviews.org/Tutorials/Dynamic_Map.html) to
explain how to explore very large or continuous parameter spaces in
HoloViews ([PR
\470](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/issues/470)).
- Various fixes and improvements for DynamicMaps including slicing
([PR \488](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/issues/488)) and
validation ([PR
\483](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/issues/478)) and
serialization ([PR
\483](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/issues/478))
- Widgets containing Matplotlib plots now display the first frame from
cache providing at least the initial frame when exporting
DynamicMaps ([PR
\486](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/issues/483))
- Fixed plotting Bokeh plots using widgets in live mode, after changes
introduced in latest Bokeh version (commit
[1b87c91e9](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/commit/1b87c91e9e7cf35b267344ccd4a2fa91dd052890)).
- Fixed issue in coloring Point/Scatter objects by values ([Issue
\467](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/issues/467)).

Backwards compatibility:

- The behavior of the `scaling_factor` on Point and Scatter plots has
changed now simply multiplying `area` or `width` (as defined by the
`scaling_method`). To disable scaling points by a dimension set
`size_index=None`.
- Removed hooks to display 3D Elements using the `BokehMPLRawWrapper`
in Bokeh ([PR \477](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/477))
- Renamed the DynamicMap mode `closed` to `bounded` ([PR
\477](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/485))

**February 7, 2016**

Over the past month since the 1.4.1 release, we have improved our
infrastructure for building documentation, updated the main website and
made several additional usability improvements.

Documentation changes:

- Major overhaul of website and notebook building making it much
easier to test user contributions ([Issue
\180](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/issues/180), [PR
\429](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/429))
- Major rewrite of the documentation ([PR
\401](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/401), [PR
\411](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/411))
- Added Columnar Data Tutorial and removed most of Pandas Conversions
as it is now supported by the core.

Fixes and improvements:

- Major improvement for grid based layouts with varying aspects ([PR
\457](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/457))
- Fix for interleaving %matplotline inline and holoviews plots ([Issue
\179](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/issues/179))
- Matplotlib legend z-orders and updating fixed ([Issue
\304](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/issues/304), [Issue
\305](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/issues/305))
- `color_index` and `size_index` plot options support specifying
dimension by name ([Issue
\391](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/issues/391))
- Added `Area` Element type for drawing area under or between Curves.
([PR \427](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/427))
- Fixed issues where slicing would remove styles applied to
an Element. ([Issue
\423](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/issues/423), [PR
\439](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/439))
- Updated the `title_format` plot option to support a `{dimensions}`
formatter ([PR \436](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/436))
- Improvements to Renderer API to allow JS and CSS requirements for
exporting standalone widgets ([PR
\426](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/426))
- Compatibility with the latest Bokeh 0.11 release ([PR
\393](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/393))

**December 22, 2015**

Over the past two weeks since the 1.4 release, we have implemented
several important bug fixes and have made several usability
improvements.

New features:

- Improved help system. It is now possible to recursively list all the
applicable documentation for a composite object. In addition, the
documentation may now be filtered using a regular
expression pattern. ([PR
\370](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/370))
- HoloViews now supports multiple active display hooks making it
easier to use nbconvert. For instance, PNG data will be embedded in
the notebook if the argument display_formats=\['html','png'\] is
supplied to the notebook_extension. ([PR
\355](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/355))
- Improvements to the display of DynamicMaps as well as many new
improvements to the Bokeh backend including better VLines/HLines and
support for the Bars element. ([PR
\367](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/367) , [PR
\362](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/362), [PR
\339](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/339)).
- New Spikes and BoxWhisker elements suitable for representing
distributions as a sequence of lines or as a box-and-whisker plot.
([PR \346](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/346), [PR
\339](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/339))
- Improvements to the notebook_extension. For instance,
executing hv.notebook_extension('bokeh') will now load BokehJS and
automatically activate the Bokeh backend (if available).
- Significant performance improvements when using the groupby
operation on HoloMaps and when working with highly
nested datastructures. ([PR
\349](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/349), [PR
\359](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/359))

Notable bug fixes:

- DynamicMaps are now properly integrated into the style system and
can be customized in the same way as HoloMaps. ([PR
\368](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/368))
- Widgets now work correctly when unicode is used in the dimension
labels and values ([PR
\376](https://github.com/pyviz/holoviews/pull/376)).