Experiment: Array API + named dimensions + units

[SimonHeybrock]

@vnmabus

This package tries to do two things at once (names and units). In my opinion, the most composable thing would be to have specialized array wrappers that do one thing well, accepting one API Array-compatible object and exposing the same API. Then the Array API standard could be extended so that it is possible to query parameters of these arrays independently on their position in the “stack” of wrappers. That way you could do, for example:

1. Pick a standard-compliant array, e.g. a CuPy array.
2. Wrap 1 in an object that adds masking.
3. Wrap 2 in an object that adds units.
4. Wrap 3 in an object that adds shape-dependent metadata (such as names).

and you should still be able to access the mask, units or metadata easily independently on the order in which the wrappers have been done. What do you think of this?

I tried something like that last year, and came to the conclusion that it is not going to “work”. I am using quotation marks, since one can actually build something that does this (see my prototype at GitHub - scipp/scippx: Prototype duck-array layering, and thread here Multiple duck array layers: Composability, implementations, and usability concerns).