This happens because PGFPlots only uses one "stack" per axis: You're stacking the second confidence interval on top of the first. The easiest way to fix this is probably to use the approach described in "Is there an easy way of using line thickness as error indicator in a plot?": After plotting the first confidence interval, stack the upper bound on top again, using stack dir=minus
. That way, the stack will be reset to zero, and you can draw the second confidence interval in the same fashion as the first:

\documentclass{standalone}
\usepackage{pgfplots, tikz}
\usepackage{pgfplotstable}
\pgfplotstableread{
temps y_h y_h__inf y_h__sup y_f y_f__inf y_f__sup
1 0.237340 0.135170 0.339511 0.237653 0.135482 0.339823
2 0.561320 0.422007 0.700633 0.165871 0.026558 0.305184
3 0.694760 0.534205 0.855314 0.074856 -0.085698 0.235411
4 0.728306 0.560179 0.896432 0.003361 -0.164765 0.171487
5 0.711710 0.544944 0.878477 -0.044582 -0.211349 0.122184
6 0.671241 0.511191 0.831291 -0.073347 -0.233397 0.086703
7 0.621177 0.471219 0.771135 -0.088418 -0.238376 0.061540
8 0.569354 0.431826 0.706882 -0.094382 -0.231910 0.043146
9 0.519973 0.396571 0.643376 -0.094619 -0.218022 0.028783
10 0.475121 0.366990 0.583251 -0.091467 -0.199598 0.016664
}{\table}
\begin{document}
\begin{tikzpicture}
\begin{axis}
% y_h confidence interval
\addplot [stack plots=y, fill=none, draw=none, forget plot] table [x=temps, y=y_h__inf] {\table} \closedcycle;
\addplot [stack plots=y, fill=gray!50, opacity=0.4, draw opacity=0, area legend] table [x=temps, y expr=\thisrow{y_h__sup}-\thisrow{y_h__inf}] {\table} \closedcycle;
% subtract the upper bound so our stack is back at zero
\addplot [stack plots=y, stack dir=minus, forget plot, draw=none] table [x=temps, y=y_h__sup] {\table};
% y_f confidence interval
\addplot [stack plots=y, fill=none, draw=none, forget plot] table [x=temps, y=y_f__inf] {\table} \closedcycle;
\addplot [stack plots=y, fill=gray!50, opacity=0.4, draw opacity=0, area legend] table [x=temps, y expr=\thisrow{y_f__sup}-\thisrow{y_f__inf}] {\table} \closedcycle;
% the line plots (y_h and y_f)
\addplot [stack plots=false, very thick,smooth,blue] table [x=temps, y=y_h] {\table};
\addplot [stack plots=false, very thick,smooth,blue] table [x=temps, y=y_f] {\table};
\end{axis}
\end{tikzpicture}
\end{document}
You can use
y filter/.expression={y==0 ? nan : y}
in the options of \addplot
.
\documentclass{article}
% ---------------------------------- tikz
\usepackage{pgfplots} % to print charts
\pgfplotsset{compat=1.12}
\begin{document}
\begin{figure}
\centering
\begin{tikzpicture}
\begin{axis} [
% general
ybar,
scale only axis,
height=0.5\textwidth,
width=1.2\textwidth,
ylabel={\# Dots},
nodes near coords,
xlabel={Variation},
xticklabel style={
rotate=90,
anchor=east,
},
%enlarge x limits={abs value={3}},
]
\addplot+[y filter/.expression={y==0 ? nan : y}] table [
x=grade,
y=value,
] {
grade value
-11 0
-10 0
-9 0
-8 0
-7 0
-6 0
-5 3
-4 1
-3 2
-2 15
-1 11
0 179
1 8
2 1
3 0
4 1
5 2
6 0
7 0
8 0
9 0
10 0
11 0
};
\end{axis}
\end{tikzpicture}
\end{figure}
\end{document}

Best Answer
Here is why:
In TikZ, the
pos=.5
option is handled by\tikz@timer
with the argument stored in\tikz@time
. The pgfplots package redefined this macro byIn this question, nodes are not positioned properly. So we now focus on line 7820.
Recall that
\pgftransformshift
is a macro with one argument. The argument will be executed first and (usually) it will calculate\pgf@x
and\pgf@y
. And then PGF will shift(\pgf@x,\pgf@y)
. (see also the manual andpgfcoretransformations.code.tex
)In other words,
\pgfplotspointplotattime{#1}
should setup\pgf@x
and\pgf@y
properly. Here is (ideally) how\pgfplotspointplotattime
should work:\tikz@time
is used before, reuse the calculated values.And here is ideally how your code will be processed
node[draw, pos = .5] (A) {}
--> new\tikz@time
, calculate everything and cache them.node[above, sloped, pos = .5] {Above}
--> same\tikz@time
, reuse.node[below, sloped, pos = .5] {Below}
--> same\tikz@time
, reuse.It turns out that when
\tikz@time
is not new, pgfplots does not setup\pgf@x
and\pgf@y
properly. The fact that theAbove
node is placed correctly is pure luck --- no one changes the values of\pgf@x
and\pgf@y
so it is placed in the same place. However the values are changed when theAbove
node is typeset, therefore theBefore
node is not placed correctly.The following example back-ups the observation above.
The following example, on the other hand, shows that pgfplots does cache other information such as slope.
To fix this problem, one may try
pos=.49999
to force pgfplots to recalculate everything. Or one might change the definition of\pgfplotspointplotattimeaddtocache
toso that it will remember the position.
MWE