[Numpy-discussion] Code samples in docstrings mistaken as doctests

[Michael McNeil Forbes]

On 23 Jun 2008, at 1:28 PM, Anne Archibald wrote:

> 2008/6/23 Michael McNeil Forbes <mforbes at physics.ubc.ca>:
>> Thus, one can argue that all examples should also be doctests.  This
>> generally makes things a little more ugly, but much less ambiguous.
>
> This is a bit awkward. How do you give an example for a random-number
> generator? Even if you are willing to include a seed in each
> statement, misleading users into thinking it's necessary, the value
> returned for a given seed is not necessarily part of the interface a
> random-number generator agrees to support.

I agree that this can be awkward sometimes, and should certainly not  
be policy, but one can usually get around this.  Instead of printing  
the result, you can use it, or demonstrate porperties:

 >>> random_array = np.random.rand(3,4)
 >>> random_array.shape
(3,4)
 >>> random_array.max() < 1
True
 >>> random_array.min() > 0
True

etc.

Michael.