PEP 450 Adding a statistics module to Python

[chris.barker at noaa.gov]

> > I am seeking comments on PEP 450, Adding a statistics module to Python's 

The trick here is that numpy really is the "right" way to do this stuff.

I like to say:
"crunching numbers in python without numpy is like doing text processing without using the string object"

What this is really an argument for is a numpy-lite in the standard library, which could be used to build these sorts of things on. But that's been rejected before...


A few other comments:

1) the numpy folks have been VERY good at providing binaries for Windows and OS-X -- easy point and click installing.

2) I hope we're almost there with standardizing pip and binary wheels, at which point pip install will be painless.

even before (2) -- pip install works fine anywhere the system is set up to build python extensions (granted, not a given on Windows and Mac, but pretty likely on Linux) -- the idea that running pip install wrote out a lot of text (but worked!) is somehow a barrier to entry is absurd -- anyone building their own stuff on Linux is used to that.

(NOTE: you only need Fortran if you want highly optimized linear algebra stuff -- clearly this use-case is for folks that don't need that!)

3) The fact that the numpy functions have optional arguments is NOT a problem -- the simple calls work as expected -- no one needs to figure out the optional arguments that doesn't need them -- and if they do need them, they had better be there!

All that being said -- if you do decide to do this, please use a PEP 3118 (enhanced buffer) supporting data type (probably array.array) -- compatibility with numpy and other packages for crunching numbers is very nice.

If someone decides to build a stand-alone stats package -- building it on a ndarray-lite (PEP 3118 compatible) object would be a nice way to go.


One other point -- for performance reason, is would be nice to have some compiled code in there -- this adds incentive to put it in the stdlib -- external packages that need compiling is what makes numpy unacceptable to some folks.

 
-Chris