Re: [Numpy-discussion] Problem with concatenate and object arrays

[Matthew B. <mat...@gm...>]

Hi,

> For example, if you do array([a,b,c]).shape(), the answer is normally
> (3,) unless a b and c happen to all be lists of the same length, at
> which point your array could have a much more complicated shape... but
> as the person who wrote "array([a,b,c])" it's tempting to assume that
> the result has shape (3,), only to discover subtle bugs much later.

Very much agree with this.

> If we were writing an array-creation function from scratch, would
> there be any reason to include object-array creation in the same
> function as uniform array creation? It seems like a bad idea to me.
>
> If not, the problem is just compatibility with Numeric. Why not simply
> write a wrapper function in python that does Numeric-style guesswork,
> and put it in the compatibility modules? How much code will actually
> break?

Can I encourage any more comments?  This suggestion seems very
sensible to me, and I guess this is our very last chance to change
this. The current behavior does seem to violate least surprise - at
least to my eye.

Best,

Matthew