Re: Rectangular multidimensional arrays for D
It might make sense to take a look at Armadillo (another C++ linear algebra library) for inspiration on multidimensional arrays.
Re: Rectangular multidimensional arrays for D
On Tuesday, 23 December 2014 at 03:11:20 UTC, Laeeth Isharc wrote: On Monday, 22 December 2014 at 22:46:57 UTC, aldanor wrote: On Monday, 22 December 2014 at 22:36:16 UTC, H. S. Teoh via Digitalmars-d wrote: FYI, Kenji's merge has since been merged. So now the stage is set for somebody to step up and write a nice multidimensional array implementation. One important thing to wish for, in my opinion, is that the design of such implementation would allow for (future potential) integration with linear algebra libraries like blas/lapack without having to be rewritten from scratch (e.g. so it doesn't end up like Python's array module which got completely superceded by numpy). You mean especially for sparse matrices ? What is it that needs to be borne in mind for regular matrices ? The layout in lapck/blas is column major so it can be handy using a wrapper around arrays to provide the FORTRAN indexing. Also you need to pass the .ptr property of the array or &a[0]. D arrays are fat and include their length. Cheers, uri
Re: Rectangular multidimensional arrays for D
On Monday, 22 December 2014 at 22:46:57 UTC, aldanor wrote: On Monday, 22 December 2014 at 22:36:16 UTC, H. S. Teoh via Digitalmars-d wrote: FYI, Kenji's merge has since been merged. So now the stage is set for somebody to step up and write a nice multidimensional array implementation. One important thing to wish for, in my opinion, is that the design of such implementation would allow for (future potential) integration with linear algebra libraries like blas/lapack without having to be rewritten from scratch (e.g. so it doesn't end up like Python's array module which got completely superceded by numpy). You mean especially for sparse matrices ? What is it that needs to be borne in mind for regular matrices ?
Re: Rectangular multidimensional arrays for D
On Monday, 22 December 2014 at 22:36:16 UTC, H. S. Teoh via Digitalmars-d wrote: FYI, Kenji's merge has since been merged. So now the stage is set for somebody to step up and write a nice multidimensional array implementation. One important thing to wish for, in my opinion, is that the design of such implementation would allow for (future potential) integration with linear algebra libraries like blas/lapack without having to be rewritten from scratch (e.g. so it doesn't end up like Python's array module which got completely superceded by numpy).
Re: Rectangular multidimensional arrays for D
On Mon, Dec 22, 2014 at 08:49:45AM +, Laeeth Isharc via Digitalmars-d wrote: > On Friday, 11 October 2013 at 22:41:06 UTC, H. S. Teoh wrote: > >What's the reason Kenji's pull isn't merged yet? As I see it, it does > >not introduce any problematic areas, but streamlines multidimensional > >indexing notation in a nice way that fits in well with the rest of > >the language. I, for one, would push for it to be merged. FYI, Kenji's merge has since been merged. So now the stage is set for somebody to step up and write a nice multidimensional array implementation. > >In any case, I've seen your multidimensional array implementation > >before, and I think it would be a good thing to have it in Phobos. In > >fact, I've written my own as well, and IIRC one or two other people > >have done the same. Clearly, the demand is there. > > > >See also the thread about std.linalg; I think before we can even talk > >about having linear algebra code in Phobos, we need a > >solidly-designed rectangular array API. As I said in that other > >thread, matrix algebra really should be built on top of a solid > >rectangular array API, and not be yet another separate kind of type > >that's similar to, but incompatible with rectangular arrays. A > >wrapper type can be used to make a rectangular array behave in the > >linear algebra sense (i.e. matrix product instead of per-element > >multiplication). > > > Hi. > > I wondered how things were developing with the rectangular arrays (not > sure who is in charge of reviewing, but I guess it is not HS Teoh). > It would be interesting to see this being available for D, and I agree > with others that it is one of the key foundation blocks one would need > to see in place before many other useful libraries can be built on > top. > > Let me know if anything I can help with (although cannot promise to > have time, I will try). [...] Well, just like almost everything in D, it just takes somebody to step up to the plate and do the work. :-) Now that language support is there, all that's left is for a good, solid design to be made, a common API that all (multi-dimensional) rectangular arrays will conform to, and a nice Phobos module to go along with it. What I envision is a set of traits for working generically with multidimensional arrays, plus some adaptors for common operations like subarrays (rectangular "windows" or "views"), and a concrete implementation that serves both as a basic packed rectangular array container and also an example of how to use the traits/adaptors. The traits would include things like determining the dimensionality of a given array, the size(s) along each dimension, and element type. Common operations include a subarray adaptor that does index remappings, iteration (in various orderings), etc.. The concrete implementation provides a concrete multidimensional rectangular array type that implements the aforementioned traits. It supports per-element operators via overloading, but not matrix algebra (which belongs in a higher-level API). Along with this, I have found in my own experiments that it is helpful to include a standard 1-dimensional "short array" type that serves as a common type for storing index sets, representing array dimensions, for use in representing (sub)regions, etc.. This "short array" type, perhaps we can call it a Vector, is basically an n-tuple of array indices (whatever the array index type is -- usually size_t, but in some applications it might make sense to allow negative array indices). A rectangular range of array indices can then be represented as a pair of Vectors (the n-dimensional equivalent of upperleft and lowerright corners). Index remappings for subarrays can then be implemented via a simple subtraction and bound on the incoming index (e.g., subarray[i1] gets remapped to originalArray[i1 - subarray.upperleft], where i1 and upperleft are Vectors). To allow convenient interoperability with explicit index lists (e.g., array[i,j,k,l]), Vectors should easily expand into argument tuples, so that writing array[v1] is equivalent to writing array[v1[0], v1[1], v2[2], ...]. None of this is groundbreaking new territory; somebody just has to sit down and sort out the API and write the code for it. T -- Why are you blatanly misspelling "blatant"? -- Branden Robinson
Re: Rectangular multidimensional arrays for D
On Mon, Dec 22, 2014 at 11:35:17AM +, aldanor via Digitalmars-d wrote: > A gap in multi-dimensional rectangular arrays functionality in D is > sure a huge blocker when trying to use it for data science tasks. > Wonder what's the general consensus on this? Kenji's PR has been merged in the meantime, so now we have the tools to build a solid multi-dim array library. Somebody just needs to do the work, that's all. T -- Debian GNU/Linux: Cray on your desktop.
Re: Rectangular multidimensional arrays for D
A gap in multi-dimensional rectangular arrays functionality in D is sure a huge blocker when trying to use it for data science tasks. Wonder what's the general consensus on this?
Re: Rectangular multidimensional arrays for D
On Friday, 11 October 2013 at 22:41:06 UTC, H. S. Teoh wrote: What's the reason Kenji's pull isn't merged yet? As I see it, it does not introduce any problematic areas, but streamlines multidimensional indexing notation in a nice way that fits in well with the rest of the language. I, for one, would push for it to be merged. In any case, I've seen your multidimensional array implementation before, and I think it would be a good thing to have it in Phobos. In fact, I've written my own as well, and IIRC one or two other people have done the same. Clearly, the demand is there. See also the thread about std.linalg; I think before we can even talk about having linear algebra code in Phobos, we need a solidly-designed rectangular array API. As I said in that other thread, matrix algebra really should be built on top of a solid rectangular array API, and not be yet another separate kind of type that's similar to, but incompatible with rectangular arrays. A wrapper type can be used to make a rectangular array behave in the linear algebra sense (i.e. matrix product instead of per-element multiplication). Hi. I wondered how things were developing with the rectangular arrays (not sure who is in charge of reviewing, but I guess it is not HS Teoh). It would be interesting to see this being available for D, and I agree with others that it is one of the key foundation blocks one would need to see in place before many other useful libraries can be built on top. Let me know if anything I can help with (although cannot promise to have time, I will try). Laeeth.
Re: Rectangular multidimensional arrays for D
On Tuesday, 8 October 2013 at 14:41:47 UTC, Denis Shelomovskij wrote: I accidentally discovered Andrei wrote [1] multidimensional array implementation is needed. If it really is, I will work to revise the API and prepare my implementation [2] for review if nobody is doing it already. Also as Kenji's "multidimensional indexing and slicing" pull [3] still not merged the only way is to use hacks like this: +1
Re: Rectangular multidimensional arrays for D
On Tue, Oct 08, 2013 at 06:42:12PM +0400, Denis Shelomovskij wrote: > I accidentally discovered Andrei wrote [1] multidimensional array > implementation is needed. If it really is, I will work to revise the > API and prepare my implementation [2] for review if nobody is doing > it already. > > Also as Kenji's "multidimensional indexing and slicing" pull [3] > still not merged the only way is to use hacks like this: > --- > // first two rows and three columns of the second matrix > array2d = matrices[1, R[0 .. 2], R[0 .. 3]]; > --- [...] What's the reason Kenji's pull isn't merged yet? As I see it, it does not introduce any problematic areas, but streamlines multidimensional indexing notation in a nice way that fits in well with the rest of the language. I, for one, would push for it to be merged. In any case, I've seen your multidimensional array implementation before, and I think it would be a good thing to have it in Phobos. In fact, I've written my own as well, and IIRC one or two other people have done the same. Clearly, the demand is there. See also the thread about std.linalg; I think before we can even talk about having linear algebra code in Phobos, we need a solidly-designed rectangular array API. As I said in that other thread, matrix algebra really should be built on top of a solid rectangular array API, and not be yet another separate kind of type that's similar to, but incompatible with rectangular arrays. A wrapper type can be used to make a rectangular array behave in the linear algebra sense (i.e. matrix product instead of per-element multiplication). T -- Debian GNU/Linux: Cray on your desktop.
Re: Rectangular multidimensional arrays for D
On Wednesday, 9 October 2013 at 08:30:11 UTC, Denis Shelomovskij wrote: 09.10.2013 7:55, Nick B пишет: On Tuesday, 8 October 2013 at 17:26:46 UTC, Stefan Frijters wrote: andrei wrote: I too are interesteed in this area as well. Dennis do you only plan to focus on multidimensional arrays only, or will you incorporate the above matrices as well ?? What features are you proposing ? I propose stuff for "multidimensional arrays only" as you noted. And I plan just to revise my existing API [1] without cardinal changes. I.e. all I propose is rectangular multidimensional arrays slicing and iterating. For matrix and math specific tasks see DScience [2] and SciD [3]. The latter started as a fork of DScience but became a separate project and is in development. See its wiki [4]. Also such math oriented libraries have to be partially (and the are) wrapper around LAPACK. Also it will be interest to see features you (Stefan and Nick) need e.g. as examples of code you want to compile with comments if needed. Write down at least basic features for now. [1] http://denis-sh.bitbucket.org/unstandard/unstd.multidimensionalarray.html [2] https://github.com/dscience-developers/dscience [3] https://github.com/kyllingstad/scid [4] https://github.com/kyllingstad/scid/wiki Ok, off the top of my head, here are some of the points that would be great for me to have. I apologize in advance if any of them are trivial / irrelevant or out of scope; I have not had time to get my hands dirty on this subject. Even if they are not to be part of the generic multidimensional array (MDA) module, these are things that I would then like to build my own implementation of without having to work with instead of against the things that will be in Phobos. - Many of my operations involve looping over the array in no particular order, so the first foreach example in your link #1 will be very useful. - Another very common operation is accessing a lattice site and looking at its neighbours to determine the outcome of the operation. Of course this is easy for nested for-loops as I can just nest one deeper and pre-calculate the neighbour offsets in another array, but I don't know if there's a canonical way to do this in terms of a foreach loop, and if this would add requirements to the MDA. As an example, Python's numpy seems to have 'generic_filter' for tasks like this[1]. In my testing it was very slow though. - I will have multiple MDAs, containing information like local densities and velocities. These will affect each other in calculations and thus being able to use zip and friends would be very useful. This would require the MDA to be a range I guess? - My code will use wrapped MPI[2] and HDF5[3] calls for parallelism and parallel IO, respectively, and because of that I will need some control over the memory layout. Nothing fancy, but the usual C-style pointer arithmetic would need to work I think, unless there's a nicer mechanism. I hope these comments can be of some help. Cheers, Stefan [1] http://docs.scipy.org/doc/scipy/reference/generated/scipy.ndimage.filters.generic_filter.html#scipy.ndimage.filters.generic_filter [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Message_Passing_Interface [3] http://www.hdfgroup.org/HDF5/
Re: Rectangular multidimensional arrays for D
09.10.2013 7:55, Nick B пишет: On Tuesday, 8 October 2013 at 17:26:46 UTC, Stefan Frijters wrote: andrei wrote: I too are interesteed in this area as well. Dennis do you only plan to focus on multidimensional arrays only, or will you incorporate the above matrices as well ?? What features are you proposing ? I propose stuff for "multidimensional arrays only" as you noted. And I plan just to revise my existing API [1] without cardinal changes. I.e. all I propose is rectangular multidimensional arrays slicing and iterating. For matrix and math specific tasks see DScience [2] and SciD [3]. The latter started as a fork of DScience but became a separate project and is in development. See its wiki [4]. Also such math oriented libraries have to be partially (and the are) wrapper around LAPACK. Also it will be interest to see features you (Stefan and Nick) need e.g. as examples of code you want to compile with comments if needed. Write down at least basic features for now. [1] http://denis-sh.bitbucket.org/unstandard/unstd.multidimensionalarray.html [2] https://github.com/dscience-developers/dscience [3] https://github.com/kyllingstad/scid [4] https://github.com/kyllingstad/scid/wiki -- Денис В. Шеломовский Denis V. Shelomovskij
Re: Rectangular multidimensional arrays for D
On Tuesday, 8 October 2013 at 17:26:46 UTC, Stefan Frijters wrote: andrei wrote: * We need to have a battery of multidimensional array shapes along with simple iteration and access primitives, at least for interfacing with scientific libraries that define and expect such formats. I'm thinking rectangular (generally hyperrectangular) matrices, triangular matrices, sparse matrices, and band matrices. I too are interesteed in this area as well. Dennis do you only plan to focus on multidimensional arrays only, or will you incorporate the above matrices as well ?? What features are you proposing ? Nick
Re: Rectangular multidimensional arrays for D
On Tuesday, 8 October 2013 at 14:41:47 UTC, Denis Shelomovskij wrote: I accidentally discovered Andrei wrote [1] multidimensional array implementation is needed. If it really is, I will work to revise the API and prepare my implementation [2] for review if nobody is doing it already. Also as Kenji's "multidimensional indexing and slicing" pull [3] still not merged the only way is to use hacks like this: --- // first two rows and three columns of the second matrix array2d = matrices[1, R[0 .. 2], R[0 .. 3]]; --- [1] http://forum.dlang.org/post/kivkp0$csp$1...@digitalmars.com [2] http://denis-sh.bitbucket.org/unstandard/unstd.multidimensionalarray.html [3] https://github.com/D-Programming-Language/dmd/pull/443 --- Previous related topics --- At least the ones I participated in: * October 09, 2011: Kenji Hara proposes "Matrix-type-friendly syntax and more". His dmd pull #443 still isn't merged. http://forum.dlang.org/thread/j6sp68$2a7k$1...@digitalmars.com https://github.com/D-Programming-Language/dmd/pull/443 * October 25, 2011: Original "Multidimensional arrays for D" post. No response from Phobos developers. http://forum.dlang.org/thread/j864es$2gi0$1...@digitalmars.com * June 17, 2012: A request for "template that can simulate a rectangular array". http://forum.dlang.org/thread * June 30, 2012: A request for "fixed size multidimensional array at runtime". http://forum.dlang.org/thread/ldjzfqvnjltbbiovq...@forum.dlang.org I don't normally post here a lot (though I'm a regular reader), but I wanted to say I for one would really appreciate an official solution for proper rectangular arrays. A bit of background: I'm a numerical physicist focusing on the lattice Boltzmann method[1], where most physical quantities live on a (3D) lattice. Currently I'm using a Fortran code with is very feature-rich, but has grown organically over a decade or so and the features have come at the cost of maintainability and performance. As I'm very much interested in the D language (though I cannot devote much time to it at the moment) I've had plans of writing my own smaller D code which would contain the features I need. It would be nice to be able to use Phobos for my 3D array needs. Slicing will also be much valued to make it easier to communicate sections of the lattice through MPI. I would aim to undertake this project after I've finished my PhD thesis, in ~2 months. I don't assume an official Phobos version would be available at that time, but even having a good idea of the API that is being aimed for would save me a lot of time I think. Cheers, Stefan [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lattice_Boltzmann_methods
Rectangular multidimensional arrays for D
I accidentally discovered Andrei wrote [1] multidimensional array implementation is needed. If it really is, I will work to revise the API and prepare my implementation [2] for review if nobody is doing it already. Also as Kenji's "multidimensional indexing and slicing" pull [3] still not merged the only way is to use hacks like this: --- // first two rows and three columns of the second matrix array2d = matrices[1, R[0 .. 2], R[0 .. 3]]; --- [1] http://forum.dlang.org/post/kivkp0$csp$1...@digitalmars.com [2] http://denis-sh.bitbucket.org/unstandard/unstd.multidimensionalarray.html [3] https://github.com/D-Programming-Language/dmd/pull/443 --- Previous related topics --- At least the ones I participated in: * October 09, 2011: Kenji Hara proposes "Matrix-type-friendly syntax and more". His dmd pull #443 still isn't merged. http://forum.dlang.org/thread/j6sp68$2a7k$1...@digitalmars.com https://github.com/D-Programming-Language/dmd/pull/443 * October 25, 2011: Original "Multidimensional arrays for D" post. No response from Phobos developers. http://forum.dlang.org/thread/j864es$2gi0$1...@digitalmars.com * June 17, 2012: A request for "template that can simulate a rectangular array". http://forum.dlang.org/thread * June 30, 2012: A request for "fixed size multidimensional array at runtime". http://forum.dlang.org/thread/ldjzfqvnjltbbiovq...@forum.dlang.org -- Денис В. Шеломовский Denis V. Shelomovskij
