From e374f0ffda19d52ec5611ef49fdb84f3133517ed Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Chang She <changshe@gmail.com>
Date: Wed, 14 Nov 2012 01:04:34 -0500
Subject: [PATCH] BUG: axes.color_cycle from mpl rcParams should not be joined
 as single string

---
 pandas/tests/test_graphics.py | 15 +++++++++++++++
 pandas/tools/plotting.py      |  4 +++-
 2 files changed, 18 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-)

diff --git a/pandas/tests/test_graphics.py b/pandas/tests/test_graphics.py
index 311295a9e2b88..0c5f1a6c3daa2 100644
--- a/pandas/tests/test_graphics.py
+++ b/pandas/tests/test_graphics.py
@@ -537,6 +537,21 @@ def test_line_colors(self):
         plt.close('all')
         df.ix[:, [0]].plot(color='DodgerBlue')
 
+    @slow
+    def test_default_color_cycle(self):
+        import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
+        plt.rcParams['axes.color_cycle'] = list('rgbk')
+
+        plt.close('all')
+        df = DataFrame(np.random.randn(5, 3))
+        ax = df.plot()
+
+        lines = ax.get_lines()
+        for i, l in enumerate(lines):
+            xp = plt.rcParams['axes.color_cycle'][i]
+            rs = l.get_color()
+            self.assert_(xp == rs)
+
 
 class TestDataFrameGroupByPlots(unittest.TestCase):
 
diff --git a/pandas/tools/plotting.py b/pandas/tools/plotting.py
index f12e2fcdf8d87..e61d1be9c824a 100644
--- a/pandas/tools/plotting.py
+++ b/pandas/tools/plotting.py
@@ -979,7 +979,9 @@ def _use_dynamic_x(self):
 
     def _get_colors(self):
         import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
-        cycle = ''.join(plt.rcParams.get('axes.color_cycle', list('bgrcmyk')))
+        cycle = plt.rcParams.get('axes.color_cycle', list('bgrcmyk'))
+        if isinstance(cycle, basestring):
+            cycle = list(cycle)
         has_colors = 'color' in self.kwds
         colors = self.kwds.get('color', cycle)
         return colors