switching to numpy and failing, a user story

[greg.landrum at gmail.com]

Travis E. Oliphant wrote:
> greg.landrum at gmail.com wrote:
> > - I guess I should just buy the documentation. I don't like this idea,
> > because I think it's counter-productive to the project to have payware
> > docs (would Python be successful if you had to buy the documentation? I
> > don't think so), but that's the way this project goes.
>
> It's probably better to call it "complete documentation."  Normal
> open-source documentation is available from http://www.scipy.org.  There
> are lots of people who have helped it.  I had to do something to at
> least pretend to justify the time NumPy took me to the people who care
> about how I spend my time (including my family).   This was the best I
> could come up with.

Given the quality of python's (free) documentation and how good it's
been for a very long time, it's bit ironic to be using the phrase
"normal open-source documentation" on this mailing list. Numeric
python, which numpy aspires to be a replacement for, has perfectly
reasonable documentation. It wasn't perfect, but it told you pretty
much everything you needed to know to get started, use the system, and
build extension modules. I guess this set my expectations for NumPy.

> Or just ask on the mailing lists, use the numpy.oldnumeric interface
> (the differences are all documented in the first few pages of my book
> which is available for free now).

"Ask on the mailing lists" is viable for the occasional question or
detail, but it's not really an efficient way to get started with a
system. At least not for me. But that's fine, I have something that
works (numeric), and I can do what I need to do there.

-greg