By the way, when text.usetex is set to True, could one
> imagine to be able to use string arguments to the mpl
> text routines whithout that leading 'r' ?
The need to use raw strings is a python requirement and not a
matplotlib requirement
s = 'this is \nu'
print s
this is
u
backslash has a special meaning to python, and the only way around
this is to either hack your own python shell (eg modify ipython),
quote the slash (eg use \\) or use a raw string. Of course, if your
TeX expression has no special characters (eg no backslashes) then you
will not need the raw string quote.
JDH