diff --git a/.gitignore b/.gitignore
index a003eda10b9827f972a29ecccbe9b67c3cfa7de1..0bd7dd9df4747b57843832bc5e9a81187eac3e97 100644
--- a/.gitignore
+++ b/.gitignore
@@ -71,6 +71,9 @@ target/
 # Jupyter Notebook
 .ipynb_checkpoints
 
+# Jupyter Notebooks converted to python
+notebooks/*.py
+
 # PyCharm
 .idea/
 
diff --git a/requirements_continuous_integration.txt b/requirements_continuous_integration.txt
index 23b4aec3351fd5effbbf8dbd1b638a20cd0319ec..af81f6733fd4be6c15d37af050824fd496cb3a52 100644
--- a/requirements_continuous_integration.txt
+++ b/requirements_continuous_integration.txt
@@ -1,16 +1,15 @@
-# contains all additional requirements to run the ```tox .``` in addition to requirements_dev.txt for ```tox -e py37,py37```
+# contains all additional requirements to run the ```tox .``` in addition to requirements_dev.txt for ```tox -e py36,py37```
 bumpversion==0.5.3
 wheel==0.32.1
 watchdog==0.9.0
 benchmarker==4.0.1
 coverage==4.5.1
 Sphinx==1.8.1
+sphinx-rtd-theme==0.4.3
 flake8==3.7.7
 flake8-eradicate==0.2.0
-
-
 twine==1.12.1
-sphinx-rtd-theme==0.4.3
-# see setup.py pycairo==1.18.1
-CairoSVG==2.3.1
 pydeps==1.7.2
+jupyter==1.0.0
+git+https://github.com/who8mylunch/Jupyter_Canvas_Widget.git@bd151ae1509c50b5809944dd3294f58b7b069c86
+
diff --git a/requirements_dev.txt b/requirements_dev.txt
index 6fd16dd56ec083a3e7ca9ae4bdfef74de558e6b6..28ed09e6321ec0f9711d8784b97f06bfe87fb2b5 100644
--- a/requirements_dev.txt
+++ b/requirements_dev.txt
@@ -9,7 +9,7 @@ recordtype==1.3
 xarray==0.11.3
 matplotlib==3.0.2
 Pillow==5.4.1
-# see setup.py pycairo==1.18.1
+# pycairo==1.18.1 is installed via setup.py since it needs special treatment under Windows
 CairoSVG==2.3.1
 msgpack==0.6.1
 svgutils==0.3.1
diff --git a/tox.ini b/tox.ini
index 1c6a3d45b2ba71dc04d0adb04a1a71b961f38dec..6e6205b847815ddcd701a3c9933a24a2657c551c 100644
--- a/tox.ini
+++ b/tox.ini
@@ -1,5 +1,5 @@
 [tox]
-envlist = py36, py37, flake8, docs, coverage, benchmark, sh
+envlist = py36, py37, flake8, examples, docs, coverage, benchmark, sh
 
 [travis]
 python =
@@ -62,6 +62,41 @@ deps =
 commands =
     sh -c 'ls benchmarks/*.py  | xargs -n 1 python'
 
+[testenv:examples]
+basepython = python
+setenv =
+    PYTHONPATH = {toxinidir}
+passenv =
+    DISPLAY
+; HTTP_PROXY+HTTPS_PROXY required behind corporate proxies
+    HTTP_PROXY
+    HTTPS_PROXY
+whitelist_externals = sh
+deps =
+    -r{toxinidir}/requirements_dev.txt
+commands =
+    sh -c 'ls examples/*.py  | xargs -n 1 python'
+
+[testenv:notebooks]
+basepython = python
+setenv =
+    PYTHONPATH = {toxinidir}
+passenv =
+    DISPLAY
+; HTTP_PROXY+HTTPS_PROXY required behind corporate proxies
+    HTTP_PROXY
+    HTTPS_PROXY
+whitelist_externals = sh
+deps =
+    -r{toxinidir}/requirements_dev.txt
+    -r{toxinidir}/requirements_continuous_integration.txt
+commands =
+    sh -c 'jupyter nbextension enable --py --sys-prefix widgetsnbextension'
+    sh -c 'jupyter nbextension enable --py --sys-prefix jpy_canvas'
+; https://stackoverflow.com/questions/35545402/how-to-run-an-ipynb-jupyter-notebook-from-terminal/35545463
+    sh -c 'ls notebooks/*.ipynb  | xargs -n 1 jupyter nbconvert --to python'
+    sh -c 'ls notebooks/*.py  | xargs -n 1 ipython'
+
 [testenv]
 whitelist_externals = sh
                       pip