[Numpy-discussion] .max() and zero length arrays

[Nick Fotopoulos]

Dear all,

I find myself frequently wanting to take the max of an array that
might have zero length.  If it is zero length, it throws an exception,
when I would like to gracefully substitute my own value.  For example,
one solution with lists is to do max(possibly_empty_list +
[minimum_value]), but it seems clunky to do a similar trick with
arrays and concatenate or to use a try: except: block.  What do other
people do?  If there's no good idiom, would it be possible to add
kwargs like default_value and/or minimum_value?

Thanks,
Nick