[SciPy-user] Subclassing array

[Michael McNeil Forbes]

I have a question about the best way to subclass array types.

I would like to create a subclass of the array types that allows me to 
name the entries of the array.  Here is a sample of my desired usage:

>>> from scipy import *
>>> a = array([1.0,2.0])
>>>
>>> class MyArray(a.__class__):
>>>   _names = ['x','y']
>>>   ... (redefine __get__ etc. as needed)
>>>
>>> c = MyArray(x=2,y=3)
>>> c.x, c.y
(2, 3)

etc.

I want c to be an array with two elements, but essentially want to be 
able to change c.__class__ to be a modified class that can access 
elements as specified by c._names.

Ideally, I would like this to work with any type that supports simple 
indexing, such as arrays, lists etc. but my first attempts seem to 
require redefining __new__ which varies for different types making the 
solution much less general.

It seems like I should be able to get the desired behaviour with 
something like the following:

      def __new__(cls,**kwargs):
        self = deepcopy(a)
        self[:] = map(kwargs.get,cls._names)
        self.__class__ = cls
        return cls

but this is not allowed because __class__ can only be set for heap types.

Is there a standard and safe way to achieve this behaviour?

Thanks,
Michael.