.. _numba-types: ==================== Types and signatures ==================== Rationale ========= As an optimizing compiler, Numba needs to decide on the type of each variable to generate efficient machine code. Python's standard types are not precise enough for that, so we had to develop our own fine-grained type system. You will encounter Numba types mainly when trying to inspect the results of Numba's type inference, for :ref:`debugging ` or :ref:`educational ` purposes. However, you need to use types explicitly if compiling code :ref:`ahead-of-time `. Signatures ========== A signature specifies the type of a function. Exactly which kind of signature is allowed depends on the context (:term:`AOT` or :term:`JIT` compilation), but signatures always involve some representation of Numba types to specifiy the concrete types for the function's arguments and, if required, the function's return type. An example function signature would be the string ``"f8(i4, i4)"`` (or the equivalent ``"float64(int32, int32)"``) which specifies a function taking two 32-bit integers and returning a double-precision float. Basic types =========== The most basic types can be expressed through simple expressions. The symbols below refer to attributes of the main ``numba`` module (so if you read "boolean", it means that symbol can be accessed as ``numba.boolean``). Many types are available both as a canonical name and a shorthand alias, following Numpy's conventions. Numbers ------- The following table contains the elementary numeric types currently defined by Numba and their aliases. =================== ========= =================================== Type name(s) Shorthand Comments =================== ========= =================================== boolean b1 represented as a byte uint8, byte u1 8-bit unsigned byte uint16 u2 16-bit unsigned integer uint32 u4 32-bit unsigned integer uint64 u8 64-bit unsigned integer int8, char i1 8-bit signed byte int16 i2 16-bit signed integer int32 i4 32-bit signed integer int64 i8 64-bit signed integer intc -- C int-sized integer uintc -- C int-sized unsigned integer intp -- pointer-sized integer uintp -- pointer-sized unsigned integer float32 f4 single-precision floating-point number float64, double f8 double-precision floating-point number complex64 c8 single-precision complex number complex128 c16 double-precision complex number =================== ========= =================================== Arrays ------ The easy way to declare array types is to subscript an elementary type according to the number of dimensions. For example a 1-dimension single-precision array:: >>> numba.float32[:] array(float32, 1d, A) or a 3-dimension array of the same underlying type:: >>> numba.float32[:, :, :] array(float32, 3d, A) This syntax defines array types with no particular layout (producing code that accepts both non-contiguous and contiguous arrays), but you can specify a particular contiguity by using the ``::1`` index either at the beginning or the end of the index specification:: >>> numba.float32[::1] array(float32, 1d, C) >>> numba.float32[:, :, ::1] array(float32, 3d, C) >>> numba.float32[::1, :, :] array(float32, 3d, F) Advanced types ============== For more advanced declarations, you have to explicitly call helper functions or classes provided by Numba. .. warning:: The APIs documented here are not guaranteed to be stable. Unless necessary, it is recommended to let Numba infer argument types by using the :ref:`signature-less variant of @jit `. .. A word of note: I only documented those types that can be genuinely useful to users, i.e. types that can be passed as parameters to a JIT function. Other types such as tuple are only usable in type inference. Inference --------- .. function:: numba.typeof(value) Create a Numba type accurately describing the given Python *value*. ``ValueError`` is raised if the value isn't supported in :term:`nopython mode`. :: >>> numba.typeof(np.empty(3)) array(float64, 1d, C) >>> numba.typeof((1, 2.0)) (int64, float64) >>> numba.typeof([0]) reflected list(int64) Numpy scalars ------------- Instead of using :func:`~numba.typeof`, non-trivial scalars such as structured types can also be constructed programmatically. .. function:: numba.from_dtype(dtype) Create a Numba type corresponding to the given Numpy *dtype*:: >>> struct_dtype = np.dtype([('row', np.float64), ('col', np.float64)]) >>> ty = numba.from_dtype(struct_dtype) >>> ty Record([('row', '>> ty[:, :] unaligned array(Record([('row', '`_. Arrays ------ .. class:: numba.types.Array(dtype, ndim, layout) Create an array type. *dtype* should be a Numba type. *ndim* is the number of dimensions of the array (a positive integer). *layout* is a string giving the layout of the array: ``A`` means any layout, ``C`` means C-contiguous and ``F`` means Fortran-contiguous. Optional types -------------- .. class:: numba.optional(typ) Create an optional type based on the underlying Numba type *typ*. The optional type will allow any value of either *typ* or :const:`None`. :: >>> @jit((optional(intp),)) ... def f(x): ... return x is not None ... >>> f(0) True >>> f(None) False