pydata / pydata/xarray

Clarify impact of datetime coordinate unit on `polyfit`, `polyval`, `integrate`, `differentiate`

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enhancement
Dominant language
Python
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Description

What is your issue?

We will soon support non-nanosecond time units. There are a few functions whose output could rely on the spacing of coordinate values: polyfit , polyval, integrate, differentiate (are there any more?)

  1. integrate and differentiate take a datetime_unit kwarg, polyfit and polyval do not.
  2. polyfit and polyval force conversion to ns: https://github.com/pydata/xarray/blob/ceb5364be999567d08ba9be832fa0440e6dd3407/xarray/core/computation.py#L2117

We probably want to relax (2) in the future. Either way it would be good to systematically think about this and at least talk about it in the docstrings.

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First steps

  1. Read the whole issue, then the project's contributing guide.
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  3. Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
  4. Open a pull request that references the issue number.

Research direction

Start in xarray/core/computation.py around the polyfit and polyval conversion referenced in the issue, then inspect the documented behavior of polyfit, polyval, integrate, and differentiate. Determine whether their datetime-unit effects are described consistently and document the agreed behavior for each function, including any additional affected functions identified during review.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Tech stack
python
Domain
data
Issue type
Documentation
Difficulty
4/5
Estimated time
3-5 days
Activity status
Stale
Clarity
Mostly clear
Newbie friendliness
35/100

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