matplotlib - How to maximize a plt.show() window using Python

Question

Just for curiosity I would like to know how to do this in the code below. I have been searching for an answer but is useless.

import numpy as np
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
data=np.random.exponential(scale=180, size=10000)
print ('el valor medio de la distribucion exponencial es: ')
print np.average(data)
plt.hist(data,bins=len(data)**0.5,normed=True, cumulative=True, facecolor='red', label='datos tamano paqutes acumulativa', alpha=0.5)
plt.legend()
plt.xlabel('algo')
plt.ylabel('algo')
plt.grid()
plt.show()

Answer 1

I am on a Windows (WIN7), running Python 2.7.5 & Matplotlib 1.3.1.

I was able to maximize Figure windows for TkAgg, QT4Agg, and wxAgg using the following lines:

from matplotlib import pyplot as plt

### for 'TkAgg' backend
plt.figure(1)
plt.switch_backend('TkAgg') #TkAgg (instead Qt4Agg)
print '#1 Backend:',plt.get_backend()
plt.plot([1,2,6,4])
mng = plt.get_current_fig_manager()
### works on Ubuntu??? >> did NOT working on windows
# mng.resize(*mng.window.maxsize())
mng.window.state('zoomed') #works fine on Windows!
plt.show() #close the figure to run the next section

### for 'wxAgg' backend
plt.figure(2)
plt.switch_backend('wxAgg')
print '#2 Backend:',plt.get_backend()
plt.plot([1,2,6,4])
mng = plt.get_current_fig_manager()
mng.frame.Maximize(True)
plt.show() #close the figure to run the next section

### for 'Qt4Agg' backend
plt.figure(3)
plt.switch_backend('QT4Agg') #default on my system
print '#3 Backend:',plt.get_backend()
plt.plot([1,2,6,4])
figManager = plt.get_current_fig_manager()
figManager.window.showMaximized()
plt.show()

if you want to maximize multiple figures you can use

for fig in figs:
    mng = fig.canvas.manager
    # ...

Hope this summary of the previous answers (and some additions) combined in a working example (at least for windows) helps. Cheers