Can matplotlib.pyplot.plot color code a curve pointwise

Question

Here is an example from matplotlib, where pyplot.plot is used and a curve is piecewise color coded.

import numpy as np
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt

t = np.arange(0.0, 2.0, 0.01)
s = np.sin(2 * np.pi * t)

upper = 0.77
lower = -0.77

supper = np.ma.masked_where(s < upper, s)
slower = np.ma.masked_where(s > lower, s)
smiddle = np.ma.masked_where((s < lower) | (s > upper), s)

fig, ax = plt.subplots()
ax.plot(t, smiddle, t, slower, t, supper)
plt.show()

My question is: Can matplotlib.pyplot.plot color code a curve also pointwise (using any color map). I know that I could use matplotlib.pyplot.scatter instead to do that.

Answer 1

No, it can't. See the documentation. As you say, use plt.scatter() for this.

You could call it for every point in your dataset using a different marker format for each, but that would be insanity, because it would effectively call .plot() for every point it plots, which is very wasteful when .scatter() exists.

If you insist though:

import numpy as np
import matplotlib as mpl
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt

n = 1000
x = np.linspace(0, 2*np.pi, n)
y = np.sin(x)

cmap = plt.get_cmap('hsv')
norm = mpl.colors.Normalize(vmin=y.min(), vmax=y.max())

for i in range(n):
    plt.plot(x[i], y[i], marker='.', markersize=25, c=cmap(norm(y[i])))
plt.show()