Coordinates

Overview

Coordinates are used to:

  1. Evaluate nodes which retrieve and process data

  2. Define the coordinates of data sources

Podpac Coordinates are modeled after the coords in xarray, with some additional restrictions and enhancements. Coordinates are created from a list of coordinate values and a corresponding list of dims:

podpac.Coordinates(values, dims=dims, ...)

Unlike xarray, podpac coordinate values are always either float or np.datetime64. For convenience, podpac automatically converts datetime strings such as '2018-01-01' to np.datetime64. In addition, the allowed dimensions are 'lat', 'lon', 'time', and 'alt'.

Coordinate Creation

Unstacked Coordinates

Unstacked multidimensional coordinates form a grid of points. For example, the following Coordinates contain three dimensions and a total of 24 points.

[.] from podpac import Coordinates
[.] lat = [0, 1, 2]
[.] lon = [10, 20, 30, 40]
[.] time = ['2018-01-01', '2018-01-02']
[.] Coordinates([lat, lon], dims=['lat', 'lon'])
Coordinates
    lat: ArrayCoordinates1d(lat): Bounds[0.0, 2.0], N[3]
    lon: ArrayCoordinates1d(lon): Bounds[10.0, 40.0], N[4]
[.] Coordinates([lat, lon, time], dims=['lat', 'lon', 'time'])
Coordinates
    lat: ArrayCoordinates1d(lat): Bounds[0.0, 2.0], N[3]
    lon: ArrayCoordinates1d(lon): Bounds[10.0, 40.0], N[4]
    time: ArrayCoordinates1d(time): Bounds[2018-01-01, 2018-01-02], N[2]

You can also create coordinates with just one dimension the same way:

>>> from podpac import Coordinates
>>> Coordinates([time], dims=['time'])
Coordinates
    time: ArrayCoordinates1d(time): Bounds[2018-01-01, 2018-01-02], N[2]

Stacked Coordinates

Coordinates from multiple dimensions can be stacked together in a list (rather than representing a grid).

For example, Coordinates with stacked latitude and longitude contain one point for each (lat, lon) pair. Note that the name for this stacked dimension is ‘lat_lon’, using an underscore to combine the underlying dimensions. The following example has a single stacked dimension and a total of 3 points.

[.] from podpac import Coordinates
[.] lat = [0, 1, 2]
[.] lon = [10, 20, 30]
[.] c = Coordinates([[lat, lon]], dims=['lat_lon'])
[.] c
Coordinates
    lat_lon[lat]: ArrayCoordinates1d(lat): Bounds[0.0, 2.0], N[3]
    lat_lon[lon]: ArrayCoordinates1d(lon): Bounds[10.0, 30.0], N[3]
[.] c['lat_lon'].coordinates[0]
(0.0, 10.0)

Coordinates can combine stacked dimensions and unstacked dimensions. For example, in the following Coordinates the (lat, lon) values and the time values form a grid of 6 total points.

[.] from podpac import Coordinates
[.] lat = [0, 1, 2]
[.] lon = [10, 20, 30]
[.] time = ['2018-01-01', '2018-01-02']
[.] c = Coordinates([[lat, lon], time], dims=['lat_lon', 'time'])
Coordinates
    lat_lon[lat]: ArrayCoordinates1d(lat): Bounds[0.0, 2.0], N[3]
    lat_lon[lon]: ArrayCoordinates1d(lon): Bounds[10.0, 30.0], N[3]
    time: ArrayCoordinates1d(time): Bounds[2018-01-01, 2018-01-02], N[2]
[.] c['lat_lon'].coordinates[0]
(0.0, 10.0)
[.] c['time'].coordinates[0]
numpy.datetime64('2018-01-01')

Uniformly-Spaced Coordinates

Podpac provides two convenience functions crange and clinspace for creating uniformly-spaced coordinates, similar to the arange and linspace functions provided by numpy.

Coordinates Range

podpac.crange creates uniformly-spaced coordinates from a start, stop, and step.

Unlike np.arange:

  • string inputs are supported for datetimes and timedeltas

  • the stop value will be included in the coordinates if it falls an exact number of steps from the start

>>> import podpac
>>> c = podpac.crange(0, 7, 2)
>>> c.coordinates
array([0., 2., 4., 6.])
>>> c = podpac.crange(0, 8, 2)
>>> c.coordinates
array([0., 2., 4., 6., 8.])
>>> c = podpac.crange('2018-01-01', '2018-03-01', '1,M')
>>> c.coordinates
array(['2018-01-01', '2018-02-01', '2018-03-01'], dtype='datetime64[D]')

Coordinates Linspace

podpac.clinspace creates uniformly-spaced coordinates from a start, stop, and size.

Unlike np.linspace:

  • string inputs are supported for datetimes

  • tuple inputs are supported for stacked coordinates

>>> import podpac
>>> c = podpac.clinspace(0, 8, 5)
>>> c.coordinates
array([0., 2., 4., 6., 8.])
>>> c = podpac.clinspace('2018-01-01', '2018-03-01', 3)
>>> c.coordinates
array(['2018-01-01', '2018-01-30', '2018-02-28'], dtype='datetime64[D]')
>>> c = podpac.clinspace((0, 10), (1, 20), 3)
>>> c.coordinates
MultiIndex(levels=[[0.0, 0.5, 1.0], [10.0, 15.0, 20.0]],
           labels=[[0, 1, 2], [0, 1, 2]])

These functions wrap UniformCoordinates1d (see Advanced Usage), which is particularly useful for coordinates with an extremely large number of points.

Rotated Coordinates

TODO

Alternate Constructors

Unstacked coordinates can also be created using the Coordinates.grid alternate constructor:

>>> from podpac import Coordinates
>>> Coordinates.grid(lat=[0, 1, 2], lon=[10, 20, 30, 40])
Coordinates
    lat: ArrayCoordinates1d(lat): Bounds[0.0, 2.0], N[3]
    lon: ArrayCoordinates1d(lon): Bounds[10.0, 40.0], N[4]

Stacked coordinates can be created using the Coordinates.points alternate constructor:

>>> from podpac import Coordinates
>>> Coordinates.points(lat=[0, 1, 2], lon=[10, 20, 30])
Coordinates
    lat_lon[lat]: ArrayCoordinates1d(lat): Bounds[0.0, 2.0], N[3]
    lat_lon[lon]: ArrayCoordinates1d(lon): Bounds[10.0, 30.0], N[3]

For convenience, a tuple can be used to generate uniformly-spaced coordinates. If the third item is an integer, it is interpreted as a size, otherwise it is interpreted as a step. The following will all be equivalent:

Coordinates.grid(lat=(0, 2, 3), lon=(10, 40, 4))
Coordinates.grid(lat=(0, 2, 1.0), lon=(10, 40, 10.0))
Coordinates.grid(lat=clinspace(0, 2, 3), lon=clinspace(10, 40, 4))
Coordinates.grid(lat=crange(0, 2, 1), lon=crange(10, 40, 10))

Note that in Python 3.5 and below, the order argument is required to both grid and points

Coordinates.grid(lat=[0, 1, 2], lon=[10, 20, 30], order=['lat', 'lon'])
Coordinates.points(lat=[0, 1, 2], lon=[10, 20, 30], order=['lat', 'lon'])

Advanced Usage

TODO

from podpac.coordinates import UniformCoordinates1d, ArrayCoordinates1d, Coordinates, StackedCoordinates
>>> lat = UniformCoordinates1d(0, 1, size=100, name='lat')
>>> lon = UniformCoordinates1d(10, 20, size=100, name='lon')
>>> time = ArrayCoordinates1d(['2018-01-01', '2018-02-03'], name='time')
>>> Coordinates([StackedCoordinates([lat, lon]), time])
Coordinates
    lat_lon[lat]: UniformCoordinates1d(lat): Bounds[0.0, 1.0], N[100]
    lat_lon[lon]: UniformCoordinates1d(lon): Bounds[10.0, 20.0], N[100]
    time: ArrayCoordinates1d(time): Bounds[2018-01-01, 2018-02-03], N[2]

Coordinate API

TODO

Coordinates contain some useful properties relating to its dimensions and underlying coordinate values.

>>> from podpac import Coordinates
>>> c = Coordinates([lat, lon, time], dims=['lat', 'lon', 'time'])
>>> c.ndims
>>> c.dims
>>> c.shape
>>> c.size

Coordinates are dict-like. The keys(), values(), and items()

Coordinates Groups

TODO