[Numpy-discussion] users point of view and ufuncs

[Bill Baxter]

On 8/24/06, Sebastian Haase <haase at msg.ucsf.edu> wrote:
>
> > I'm not sure what this question is asking, so I'll answer what I think
> > it is asking.
> >
> > The mean, min, max, and average functions are *not* ufuncs.   They are
> > methods of particular ufuncs.
> >
> Yes - that's what  wanted to hear !  I'm just trying to bring in the
> "user's" point of view:  Not thinking about how they are implemented
> under the hood:  mean,min,max,average  have a very similar "feeling" to
> them as "abs".


While we're on the subject of the "user's" point of view, the term "ufunc"
is not very new-user friendly, yet it gets slung around fairly often.  I'm
not sure what to do about it exactly, but maybe for starters it would be
nice to add a concise definition of "ufunc" to the numpy glossary:
http://www.scipy.org/Numpy_Glossary.

Can anyone come up with such a definition?  Here's my stab at it:

       ufunc:  A function that operates element-wise on arrays.

But I have a feeling there's more to it than that.
--bb
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