[SciPy-dev] Pre-release fixes

[Robert Kern]

Travis Oliphant wrote:
[snip]
> I think I know what is wrong.  Apparently, the reduce method expects the 
> output type to be the same as the input type.  So, when the underlying 
> code is called in that context, what actually gets passed in is not an 
> unsigned byte array.  Thus, when the code casts the pointer to an 
> unsigned byte pointer, it is filling in only a portion of the memory.  
> On little-endian machines this is working fine, but on big-endian 
> machines it's the wrong portion to be filling in.   Robert's fix will 
> correct the problem for reduce on MacOS but then I'm not sure that 
> logical_and will work correctly on two arrays still as in that context 
> the output array should be a UInt8 and so you will be filling a UInt8 
> array assuming it is IntXX.

Check the signatures again. The logical_* functions use 
divide_safe_signatures which does not output to UInt8.

CVS on Athlon/Linux:

 >>> from scipy import *
 >>> a = array([0,1])
 >>> b = array([1,1])
 >>> logical_and(a,b)
array([0, 1])
 >>> logical_and(a.astype(Float),b.astype(Float))
array([  0.00000000e+000,   4.94065646e-324])
 >>> logical_and(a.astype(Float32),b.astype(Float32))
array([  0.00000000e+000   1.40129846e-45],'f')
 >>> logical_and.reduce(array([[0,1],[1,1]]).astype(Float))
array([ 0.,  1.])
 >>> import struct
 >>> struct.unpack('f', '\x01\x00\x00\x00')
(1.4012984643248171e-45,)
 >>> struct.unpack('d', '\x01\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00')
(4.9406564584124654e-324,)

> Bottom line is I don't think the fixes will work on all platforms but 
> will fix one at the expense of another?  Can you comment on this Robert?

Yes, just changing the signatures to correctly output to UInt8 solves 
the logical_and(a, b) problem just fine with either endianness. The 
logical_and.reduce(b) problem needs more work. Even changing the 
signatures still makes logical_and.reduce(b) return an array the same 
type as b.

> Darn,  this seems like a pretty serious problem.
> 
> -Travis

-- 
Robert Kern
rkern at ucsd.edu

"In the fields of hell where the grass grows high
  Are the graves of dreams allowed to die."
   -- Richard Harter