Adding theme(panel.border=element_rect(...)) resets the plot

[jrnold]

The following code produces a weird error. It renders the plot twice, the second time producing a plot with almost nothing on it. This doesn't appear when adding themes with other elements.

dsamp <- diamonds[sample(nrow(diamonds), 1000), ] 
(qplot(carat, price, data=dsamp, colour=clarity)
 + theme(panel.border = element_rect()))

This produces the same error

(qplot(carat, price, data=dsamp, colour=clarity)
 + theme(panel.border = element_rect(colour="black")))

This doesn't produce an error

(qplot(carat, price, data=dsamp, colour=clarity)
 + theme(panel.background = element_rect(colour="black")))

[wch]

Previously the default fill for theme_rect() was NA, but now it default to the value set by the top-level rect element. In theme_grey(), this top-level fill value is white. The white fill is overlaid on the plot, which is why you can't see anything. To make it go away, set fill=NA:

dsamp <- diamonds[sample(nrow(diamonds), 1000), ]

qplot(carat, price, data=dsamp, colour=clarity) +
  theme(panel.border=element_rect(fill=NA))

[jrnold]

Thanks. I guess I was confused about the difference between panel.border and panel.background.

[wch]

No worries. It's true that the difference isn't well documented. The purpose for panel border is to draw a bounding rectangle that is on top of things like tick marks. I've improved the help for it in the dev version:
https://github.com/hadley/ggplot2/blob/master/R/theme.r#L127

[jrnold]

I'm glad I made the mistake; this makes a lot more sense now.

[thesickish]

Thanks for the help, wch! I had the exact same problem. It would be good to add this note to http://docs.ggplot2.org/0.9.2.1/theme.html as, currently, panel.border makes the entire graph disappear (in the example, ~3/4 of the way down the page)..