[Numpy-discussion] confusing recarray behaviour

[Jonathan Taylor]

I'm new to recarrays and have been struggling with them. I keep getting 
an exception

TypeError: expected a readable buffer object

with no informative traceback.

What I pass to N.array seems to agree with the examples in numpybook.

Below is an example that does work for me (excuse the longish example 
but it was just cut and paste to make my life easier). In my code, funny 
things happen
(see ipython excerpt below this). In particular, I have a list v with 
v[0:2] = V and with the
same dtype "ddesc" I get this exception when I change V to v[0:2].

Any help would be appreciated.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
import numpy as N

timedesc = N.dtype({'names':['tm_year',     
                             'tm_mon',    
                             'tm_mday',
                             'tm_hour',
                             'tm_min',   
                             'tm_sec',
                             'tm_wday',
                             'tm_yday',
                             'tm_isdst'],
                    'formats':['i2']*9})

ddesc = N.dtype({'names': ('Week',
                          'Date',
                          'Institution',
                          'SeqNo',
                          'HeightDone',
                          'Height',
                          'UnitsH',
                          'WeightDone',
                          'Weight',
                          'Units',
                          'PulseDone',
                          'Pulse',
                          'BPdone',
                          'BPSys',
                          'BPDia',
                          'PID',
                          'RN'),
                'formats': ['f4',
                            timedesc] + ['f4']*15})
                                         


V = [(12.0, (2005, 4, 22, 0, 0, 0, 4, 112, -1), 501.0,
      1.0, 2.0, 0.0, 0, 1.0, 91.5, 1.0, 1.0, 87.0, 1.0, 129.0,
      76.0, 107.0, 11.0),
     (24.0, (2005, 2, 1, 0, 0, 0, 1, 32, -1), 504.0,
      1.0, 2.0, 0.0, 0, 1.0, 166.0, 2.0, 1.0, 84.0, 1.0, 128.0,
      78.0,  401.0, 7.0)
     ]

w=N.array(V, dtype=ddesc)

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

In [97]:v[0:2] == V
Out[97]:True

In [98]:N.array(V, ddesc)
Out[98]:
array([ (12.0, (2005, 4, 22, 0, 0, 0, 4, 112, -1), 501.0, 1.0, 2.0, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0, 91.5, 1.0, 1.0, 87.0, 1.0, 129.0, 76.0, 107.0, 11.0),
       (24.0, (2005, 2, 1, 0, 0, 0, 1, 32, -1), 504.0, 1.0, 2.0, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0, 166.0, 2.0, 1.0, 84.0, 1.0, 128.0, 78.0, 401.0, 7.0)],
      dtype=[('Week', '<f4'), ('Date', [('tm_year', '<i2'), ('tm_mon', '<i2'), ('tm_mday', '<i2'), ('tm_hour', '<i2'), ('tm_min', '<i2'), ('tm_sec', '<i2'), ('tm_wday', '<i2'), ('tm_yday', '<i2'), ('tm_isdst', '<i2')]), ('Institution', '<f4'), ('SeqNo', '<f4'), ('HeightDone', '<f4'), ('Height', '<f4'), ('UnitsH', '<f4'), ('WeightDone', '<f4'), ('Weight', '<f4'), ('Units', '<f4'), ('PulseDone', '<f4'), ('Pulse', '<f4'), ('BPdone', '<f4'), ('BPSys', '<f4'), ('BPDia', '<f4'), ('PID', '<f4'), ('RN', '<f4')])

In [99]:N.array(v[0:2], ddesc)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
exceptions.TypeError                                 Traceback (most recent call last)

/home/jtaylo/svn/personal/projects/deescalate/python/<ipython console>

TypeError: expected a readable buffer object



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Jonathan Taylor                           Tel:   650.723.9230
Dept. of Statistics                       Fax:   650.725.8977
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