Relation: a new standard (PEP) container?

[Scott]

We've been using a simple container implementation of a mathematical relation (https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relation_(mathematics)) (i.e. an invertible M:M mapping) for some time.
We've been waiting for many years (decades actually) to have this concept incorporated as a standard container in one of the modern programming languages so we could swap our code with a language-standard container. To further these efforts, we have decided to initiate a conversation with the python community on adding a relation as a standard Python container package. 

Briefly the uses of a relation are:

- quickly finding the values/range associated with keys/domain (e.g. *inversion*)
- maintaining a unique relationship between keys and values,(e.g. *isomorphism* or *aliasing*)
- using keys to categorize (one-to-many) values (e.g. *partitioning*)
- associating two sets in an arbitrary/bipartite manner (e.g. *tagging*)

Below is a link to an implementation, including an ipython notebook with light exposition and some canonical examples. We'll also be presenting a poster at SciPy 2015. Let us know if this, or something like it, seems like a worthwhile addition to the standard Python distribution.

Thank you,

Scott James, James Larkin

scott.james at noblis.org 
james.larkin at noblis.org


https://github.com/scott-howard-james/relate 


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