setylim

Setylim is a function used in plotting libraries, most commonly as a method of an axes object in Matplotlib, to specify the lower and upper limits of the y-axis for a given plot. It does not change the underlying data; it only controls the portion of the vertical range that is displayed.

In practice, setylim is called on an axes instance, for example as ax.set_ylim(0, 100) or ax.set_ylim([0, 100]). Passing None for a bound can allow that bound to be determined automatically by the plotting library. When explicit limits are set, the axis is fixed to that range and automatic rescaling of the y-axis is typically disabled until autoscale is invoked again.

This function is useful for zooming in on a particular data range, ensuring consistent y-axis scales across multiple subplots for comparison, or preparing figures for publication where a standard axis range is required. After setting limits, data outside the specified range is clipped from the visible area, though it remains part of the dataset.

In Matplotlib, setylim is the object-oriented interface equivalent to the pyplot function ylim, which applies to the current axes. The two forms are interchangeable in common workflows: ax.set_ylim(...) and plt.ylim(...). Setylim is distinct from setting x-axis limits (set_xlim) and is often used in conjunction with other axis controls (such as autoscale, axis aspect, and tick methods) to fine-tune the figure’s presentation.

Notes: setylim is a term associated with Python’s Matplotlib and similar APIs. In MATLAB, the comparable operation is performed by ylim([ymin ymax]), not by a setylim function.