| Re: Python and IDL [message #39619 is a reply to message #39570] |
Fri, 04 June 2004 03:13   |
Nigel Wade
Messages: 286
Registered: March 1998
|
Senior Member |
|
|
On Fri, 28 May 2004 10:38:08 -0500, Michael Wallace wrote:
> I'm probably the only person here who'd be interested in this, but I
> guess I'll throw it out anyway.
>
> I have recently started using Python and love the language. Python is
> interpreted, interactive, object oriented, and has dynamic data types
> and dynamic typing. From this perspective, IDL and Python are very
> similar. There are even projects such as SciPy (http://www.scipy.org)
> which add some scientific analysis to the language.
>
> Python does have a couple nice benefits, namely the huge number of
> modules available where there's everything from operating system
> commands to networking to XML to email etc. One thing I've found myself
> doing recently is writing my core analysis processing code in IDL and
> then writing a Python wrapper around the particular code. For example,
> in one of my programs, I use Python to automatically download files from
> an FTP site and then call IDL to do the specific processing on the
> files. In another program, I use Python to process command line
> arguments and then call the appropriate IDL code based on the arguments.
>
> Currently, in my Python programs I open a pipe to an IDL process and
> write the IDL commands to the pipe. What I'm wondering is if there is
> an efficient way to send data from IDL back to Python. The only thing
> I've found so far is to have IDL write data to stdout and set up the
> Python side to read this stream. However, this can get pretty
> inefficient at times. Without any direct conversion between the two
> languages available, are there any other (i.e. better, efficient) ways
> to set up bi-directional interprocess communication between Python and IDL?
>
> What'd be really nice is if RSI provided some mechanism for IDL and
> Python to communicate at a much closer level than interprocess
> communication. Karl, that's a hint. ;-)
>
> -Mike
The cleanest way would be to create a Python DLM, built using
an embedded Python interpreter. The DLM interface routines could pick
apart any IDL variables and create Python variables (possibly) using the
same memory (you'd need to check on row-major vs. column-major issues for
multi-dimensional arrays), then add these Python variables to the global
dictionary.
I've built an embedded interpreter into a C program, but not an IDL
DLM. I don't think there are any intrinsic reasons why it wouldn't be
possible.
--
Nigel Wade, System Administrator, Space Plasma Physics Group,
University of Leicester, Leicester, LE1 7RH, UK
E-mail : nmw@ion.le.ac.uk
Phone : +44 (0)116 2523548, Fax : +44 (0)116 2523555
|
|
|
|
comp.lang.idl-pvwave archive
Members
Search
Help
Login
Home
