[Numpy-discussion] nested recarrays

[Matthew Koichi Grimes]

(Newbie alert.)

I'm having trouble making a nested record array. I'm trying to work from 
the following example on the scipy.org examples page:

  >>> mydescriptor = dtype([('x', 'f4'),('y', 'f4'), # nested recarray
  ... ('nested', [('i', 'i2'),('j','i2')])])
  >>> myarr = array([(1.0, 2.0, (1,2))], dtype=mydescriptor)


... but this isn't really a nested recarray, since you can't refer to 
fields 'x', 'y', or 'nested' as attributes:

  >>> myarr.x
  AttributeError: 'numpy.ndarray' object has no attribute 'x'

You have to use the more cumbersome bracket notation:

  >>> myarr['x']
  array([ 1.], dtype=float32)

When I try modifying the above example by simply replacing the 'array' 
constructor with 'recarray', I get the following error, which I haven't 
really grokked yet:

  >>> myrecarr = N.recarray([(1.0, 2.0, (1,2))], dtype=dt)
  
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
  exceptions.TypeError                                 Traceback (most 
recent call last)

  /home/mkg/<ipython console>

  /usr/lib/python2.4/site-packages/numpy/core/records.py in 
__new__(subtype, shape, dtype, buf, offset, strides, formats, names, 
titles, byteorder, aligned)
      176
      177         if buf is None:
  --> 178             self = sb.ndarray.__new__(subtype, shape, (record, 
descr))
      179         else:
      180             self = sb.ndarray.__new__(subtype, shape, (record, 
descr),

  TypeError: an integer is required


I'm trying to make a record array that stores two record arrays called 
"states" and "controls", each of which store two float arrays "x" and 
"dx". The dtype would be something like:
dtype([('states', [('x', 'f4'), ('dx, 'f4')]), ('controls', [('x', 
'f4'), ('dx', 'f4')])])

It'd be great if I could address elements as:
myarr.states.x[0]
as opposed to
myarr['states']['x'][0]

Any tips would be greatly appreciated. Once I figure this out, I'd be 
glad to post the solution as an example under the "recarray()" entry in 
the examples list.

-- Matt