.. _plot_map:

Plotting the results
=============================

In addition to the probability density distribution for the flux (see :ref:`real_time_proba`), plots showing the computed electron density along each transmitter-receiver path are generated each time the :py:meth:`vlf4ions.forecast_nowcast.nowcast.run` method is called.

The electron density at 70 km is computed on each path using results from the LMP model (see :ref:`LMP`). The resulting plots are generated in pdf format, with the name\ ``last_map.pdf``\ at the specified path. An example is shown below:

.. figure:: ../Figures/Example_map.png

    Example of output map obtained with the :py:func:`~vlf4ions.plot_map.plot_map` function. The color of each path represents the electron density computed from the values of :py:attr:`DA` and :py:attr:`DP` for each station.

The :py:func:`~vlf4ions.plot_map.plot_map` can also be used outside of the code, provided that each station is an instance of the :py:class:`~vlf4ions.class_definition.station` class and that :py:attr:`DA` and :py:attr:`DP` are defined as attributes of this class.

The upper bound for the colorbar of those map is automatically increased if needed to represent all computed densities (at 70 km).