[Numpy-discussion] Keyword argument order changed in records.py

[Travis Oliphant]

In an effort to preserve consistency, I made a change to the keyword 
argument order in the functions in records.py.   In addition, all of the 
functions now take a dtype= keyword argument.  This keyword argument is 
placed first along with other needed keyword arguments.

When the dtype keyword is given then it's argument is converted to a 
data-type object and
used in the record array.

Otherwise (and only when dtype=None) the formats, names, titles, 
aligned, and byteorder arguments are
used to construct the data-type object.  These arguments are always last 
in the keyword argument order.

Bascially, when these are given the rec.format_parser class is run to 
construct a data-type object from them:

Thus using these keywords in place of data-type is equivalent to

dtype = format_parser(formats, names, titles, aligned, byteorder)._descr


Please let me know if this causes problems.  As long as you used keyword 
arguments, the changes should have no effect on code written for NumPy.


Best,

-Travis