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fix: handle deprecated space_kwargs gracefully in SpaceRenderer.rende…#3269

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DipayanDasgupta:fix-spacerenderer-crash-3216
Feb 11, 2026
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fix: handle deprecated space_kwargs gracefully in SpaceRenderer.rende…#3269
quaquel merged 3 commits intomesa:mainfrom
DipayanDasgupta:fix-spacerenderer-crash-3216

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@DipayanDasgupta DipayanDasgupta commented Feb 9, 2026

Summary

This PR adds a safeguard to SpaceRenderer.render to prevent a hard AttributeError crash when the deprecated space_kwargs argument is passed.

Bug / Issue

Closes #3216

Context:
Currently, if a user (or a legacy script/tutorial) passes space_kwargs to renderer.render(), the method blindly merges it into kwargs and passes it to the backend drawer.
What happened: Matplotlib raises AttributeError: Line2D.set() got an unexpected keyword argument 'space_kwargs' because the dictionary key wasn't unpacked.
What was expected: The renderer should handle the deprecated argument gracefully (by unpacking its contents) or at least not crash the entire application.

Implementation

Modified mesa/visualization/space_renderer.py inside the render method:

  1. Checked if space_kwargs exists in kwargs.
  2. Extracted the dictionary value and merged it into self.draw_space_kwargs (which is the correct destination for these parameters).
  3. Removed space_kwargs from kwargs to prevent it from being passed downstream to the backend (Matplotlib/Altair) where it causes the crash.

Testing

I created a local reproduction script to verify the fix:

Reproduction Code:

renderer.render(space_kwargs={"color": "black", "alpha": 0.1})

Results:

  • Before: Crashed with AttributeError: Line2D.set() got an unexpected keyword argument 'space_kwargs'.
  • After: Renders successfully without error.

Additional Notes

While PR #3223 and #3231 updated the tutorials to use the new API, the underlying library code remained fragile. This fix ensures that users who copy-paste old code or haven't updated their scripts yet will encounter a warning rather than a hard crash, improving the DevEx.

@DipayanDasgupta DipayanDasgupta mentioned this pull request Feb 9, 2026
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github-actions bot commented Feb 9, 2026

Performance benchmarks:

Model Size Init time [95% CI] Run time [95% CI]
BoltzmannWealth small 🔵 -1.7% [-2.3%, -1.2%] 🔵 -0.1% [-0.3%, +0.1%]
BoltzmannWealth large 🔵 -1.5% [-2.1%, -1.0%] 🔵 -0.6% [-0.7%, -0.5%]
Schelling small 🔵 -0.7% [-0.9%, -0.6%] 🔵 +0.1% [-0.0%, +0.2%]
Schelling large 🔵 +0.2% [-0.3%, +0.7%] 🔵 +1.7% [+1.3%, +2.0%]
WolfSheep small 🔵 -0.9% [-1.0%, -0.7%] 🔵 -0.9% [-1.1%, -0.8%]
WolfSheep large 🔵 -0.6% [-1.2%, +0.0%] 🔵 -1.0% [-1.5%, -0.5%]
BoidFlockers small 🔵 -1.0% [-1.2%, -0.7%] 🔵 -1.8% [-2.0%, -1.6%]
BoidFlockers large 🔵 -0.6% [-1.1%, -0.3%] 🔵 -0.4% [-0.6%, -0.2%]

@Sahil-Chhoker
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Sahil-Chhoker commented Feb 10, 2026

It can also contain agent_kwargs(check the documentation for exact name), can you add it's extraction as well?

@DipayanDasgupta DipayanDasgupta force-pushed the fix-spacerenderer-crash-3216 branch from 107eaf6 to 14abde7 Compare February 10, 2026 12:25
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DipayanDasgupta commented Feb 10, 2026

@Sahil-Chhoker Added it as you suggested.

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Sahil-Chhoker commented Feb 10, 2026

@DipayanDasgupta I'm seeing indentation problems in your code, fix that please.

@quaquel quaquel added the enhancement Release notes label label Feb 10, 2026
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souro26 commented Feb 10, 2026 •
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A small suggestion i had is since we’re now handling multiple deprecated kwargs (space_kwargs, agent_kwargs), it might be cleaner to extract them in a single pass before updating draw_space_kwargs. , something like

deprecated = {
    "space_kwargs": self.draw_space_kwargs,
    "agent_kwargs": self.draw_agent_kwargs,
}
for key, target in deprecated.items():
    if key in kwargs:
        val = kwargs.pop(key)
        if isinstance(val, dict):
            target.update(val)

This keeps the logic simple and avoids adding more conditional blocks as new legacy kwargs come up.

@DipayanDasgupta DipayanDasgupta force-pushed the fix-spacerenderer-crash-3216 branch from 14abde7 to 69cc2f9 Compare February 10, 2026 17:50
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DipayanDasgupta commented Feb 10, 2026

@Sahil-Chhoker @souro26 Thank you both for the constructive feedback! I've updated the PR to address all the points raised:

  1. Completeness: Added handling for agent_kwargs alongside space_kwargs as requested.
  2. Refactor: Adopted the dictionary loop approach suggested by @souro26 to handle these deprecated arguments cleanly and scalably.
  3. Style & Linting: Corrected the indentation issues and resolved a ruff docstring error (missing self description) that was blocking the pre-commit hook.

The implementation is now much cleaner and fully robust against legacy kwargs. Please let me know if there are any other improvements needed before merging!

Sahil-Chhoker
Sahil-Chhoker approved these changes Feb 11, 2026
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Thanks @DipayanDasgupta for the PR and @souro26 for helping in the logic, just a couple comments after that this PR is good to go from my side.

mesa/visualization/space_renderer.py Outdated
"""Render the complete space with structure, agents, and property layers.

Args:
self: The SpaceRenderer instance.
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Remove this comment, self is automatically passed.

quaquel
quaquel reviewed Feb 11, 2026
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@DipayanDasgupta DipayanDasgupta force-pushed the fix-spacerenderer-crash-3216 branch from 1358976 to 672e4ad Compare February 11, 2026 06:46
@DipayanDasgupta DipayanDasgupta force-pushed the fix-spacerenderer-crash-3216 branch from 672e4ad to 618db48 Compare February 11, 2026 07:09
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DipayanDasgupta commented Feb 11, 2026

@quaquel @Sahil-Chhoker I've made the recommended changes , if there's anything else to be done before its good to merge, please do let me know.

@quaquel quaquel merged commit f5fef2f into mesa:main Feb 11, 2026
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Property Layer Visualization Example AttributeError: 'space_kwargs'

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@DipayanDasgupta @Sahil-Chhoker @souro26 @quaquel