Issue 1:
Debian SID, Clean virtual environment with packages:

ipdb==0.7
ipython==1.0.0
matplotlib==1.3.0

and their dependencies.

In [1]: %pdb on
Automatic pdb calling has been turned ON

In [2]: import matplotlib.pyplot
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
UnicodeDecodeError Traceback (most recent call last)
<ipython-input-2-6f467123fe04> in <module>()
----> 1 import matplotlib.pyplot

/home/liori/tmp/mpl/.ve/local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/matplotlib/pyplot.py in <module>()
22
23 import matplotlib
---> 24 import matplotlib.colorbar
25 from matplotlib import _pylab_helpers, interactive
26 from matplotlib.cbook import dedent, silent_list, is_string_like, is_numlike

/home/liori/tmp/mpl/.ve/local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/matplotlib/colorbar.py in <module>()
27 import matplotlib.artist as martist
28 import matplotlib.cbook as cbook
---> 29 import matplotlib.collections as collections
30 import matplotlib.colors as colors
31 import matplotlib.contour as contour

/home/liori/tmp/mpl/.ve/local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/matplotlib/collections.py in <module>()
21 import matplotlib.artist as artist
22 from matplotlib.artist import allow_rasterization
---> 23 import matplotlib.backend_bases as backend_bases
24 import matplotlib.path as mpath
25 from matplotlib import _path

/home/liori/tmp/mpl/.ve/local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/matplotlib/backend_bases.py in <module>()
48
49 import matplotlib.tight_bbox as tight_bbox
---> 50 import matplotlib.textpath as textpath
51 from matplotlib.path import Path
52 from matplotlib.cbook import mplDeprecation

/home/liori/tmp/mpl/.ve/local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/matplotlib/textpath.py in <module>()
9 from matplotlib.path import Path
10 from matplotlib import rcParams
---> 11 import matplotlib.font_manager as font_manager
12 from matplotlib.ft2font import FT2Font, KERNING_DEFAULT, LOAD_NO_HINTING
13 from matplotlib.ft2font import LOAD_TARGET_LIGHT

/home/liori/tmp/mpl/.ve/local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/matplotlib/font_manager.py in <module>()
1354 verbose.report("Using fontManager instance from %s" % _fmcache)
1355 except:
-> 1356 _rebuild()
1357 else:
1358 _rebuild()

/home/liori/tmp/mpl/.ve/local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/matplotlib/font_manager.py in _rebuild()
1339 def _rebuild():
1340 global fontManager
-> 1341 fontManager = FontManager()
1342 if _fmcache:
1343 pickle_dump(fontManager, _fmcache)

/home/liori/tmp/mpl/.ve/local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/matplotlib/font_manager.py in __init__(self, size, weight)
1002 self.defaultFont['ttf'] = self.ttffiles[0]
1003
-> 1004 self.ttflist = createFontList(self.ttffiles)
1005
1006 self.afmfiles = findSystemFonts(paths, fontext='afm') + \

/home/liori/tmp/mpl/.ve/local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/matplotlib/font_manager.py in createFontList(fontfiles, fontext)
582 continue
583 try:
--> 584 prop = ttfFontProperty(font)
585 except KeyError:
586 continue

/home/liori/tmp/mpl/.ve/local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/matplotlib/font_manager.py in ttfFontProperty(font)
396 sfnt2 = ''
397 if sfnt4:
--> 398 sfnt4 = sfnt4.decode('ascii').lower()
399 else:
400 sfnt4 = ''

UnicodeDecodeError: 'ascii' codec can't decode byte 0x8a in position 6: ordinal not in range(128)
> /home/liori/tmp/mpl/.ve/local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/matplotlib/font_manager.py(398)ttfFontProperty()
397 if sfnt4:
--> 398 sfnt4 = sfnt4.decode('ascii').lower()
399 else:

ipdb> p sfnt4
'EPSON \x8a\xdb\x83S\x83V\x83b\x83N\x91\xcc\x82l'
ipdb>

For a workaround I changed the above to sfnt4.decode('ascii', 'ignore').lower()

Issue 2:
I have found the following problem:

I tried a new Installation of Python 3.3.2 64-bit with WinPython-64bit-3.3.2.2 on a Windows 7 64 bit machine.

Ever when I try to import matplotlib.pyplot (with some of my user accounts i use on this Windows-7 machine) I get tthe following error message:

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "D:\WinPython_3.3.2.2\python-3.3.2.amd64\lib\site-packages\matplotlib\font_manager.py", line 1348, in

fontManager = pickle_load(_fmcache)

File "D:\WinPython_3.3.2.2\python-3.3.2.amd64\lib\site-packages\matplotlib\font_manager.py", line 947, in pickle_load

with open(filename, 'rb') as fh:

FileNotFoundError: [Errno 2] No such file or directory: 'C:\Users\Jobst3.matplotlib\fontList.py3k.cache'

During handling of the above exception, another exception occurred:

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "", line 1, in

File "D:\WinPython_3.3.2.2\python-3.3.2.amd64\lib\site-packages\matplotlib\pyplot.py", line 24, in

import matplotlib.colorbar

File "D:\WinPython_3.3.2.2\python-3.3.2.amd64\lib\site-packages\matplotlib\colorbar.py", line 29, in

import matplotlib.collections as collections

File "D:\WinPython_3.3.2.2\python-3.3.2.amd64\lib\site-packages\matplotlib\collections.py", line 23, in

import matplotlib.backend_bases as backend_bases

File "D:\WinPython_3.3.2.2\python-3.3.2.amd64\lib\site-packages\matplotlib\backend_bases.py", line 50, in

import matplotlib.textpath as textpath

File "D:\WinPython_3.3.2.2\python-3.3.2.amd64\lib\site-packages\matplotlib\textpath.py", line 11, in

import matplotlib.font_manager as font_manager

File "D:\WinPython_3.3.2.2\python-3.3.2.amd64\lib\site-packages\matplotlib\font_manager.py", line 1356, in

_rebuild()

File "D:\WinPython_3.3.2.2\python-3.3.2.amd64\lib\site-packages\matplotlib\font_manager.py", line 1341, in _rebuild

fontManager = FontManager()

File "D:\WinPython_3.3.2.2\python-3.3.2.amd64\lib\site-packages\matplotlib\font_manager.py", line 1004, in init

self.ttflist = createFontList(self.ttffiles)

File "D:\WinPython_3.3.2.2\python-3.3.2.amd64\lib\site-packages\matplotlib\font_manager.py", line 584, in createFontList

prop = ttfFontProperty(font)

File "D:\WinPython_3.3.2.2\python-3.3.2.amd64\lib\site-packages\matplotlib\font_manager.py", line 398, in ttfFontProperty

sfnt4 = sfnt4.decode('ascii').lower()

UnicodeDecodeError: 'ascii' codec can't decode byte 0x82 in position 0: ordinal not in range(128)

The same issue happens with other python version (3.2.3 64 bit, as I installed matplotlib 1.3. with easy install).

I found out that this happens only with newly created user accounts, but not with older accounts. As I found out, python is looking for a file located in the user folder: C:\Users\Jobst3.matplotlib\fontList.py3k.cache' which is not there in the newly created user account.

But the file is available in older user accounts. The file was created by an older version of matplotlib (matplotlib-1.2.0rc2.win-amd64-py3.2), and everything goes fine, if i use these accounts.

I am not able to test the issue on a complete new and clean Windows-7 machine at the moment

Matthias