RFC: add `"mutable arrays"` to `capabilities`

[jakevdp]

Several parts of the Array API standard assume that array objects are mutable. Some array API implementations (notably JAX) do not support mutating array objects. This has led to array API implementations currently being developed in scipy and sklearn to be entirely unusable in JAX.

Given this, downstream implementations have a few choices:

1. Use mutability semantics, excluding libraries like JAX.
2. Avoid mutability semantics to support libraries like JAX.
3. Explicitly special-case arrays of type jax.numpy.Array, changing the implementation logic for that case.

(1) is a bad choice, because it means JAX will not be supported. (2) is a bad choice, because for libraries like NumPy, it leads to excessive copying of buffers, worsening performance. (3) is a bad choice because it hard-codes the presence of specific implementations in a context that is supposed to be implementation-agnostic.

One way the Array API standard could address this is by adding "mutable arrays" or something similar to the existing capabilities dict. Then downstream implementations could use strategy (3) without special-casing particular implementations.

[jakevdp]

(to anticipate one response: no, it's not possible to make JAX arrays support mutation: central to JAX are transformations like jit, vmap, grad, etc. that rely on immutability assumptions in their program tracing)

[lucascolley]

For (3), could you prototype what it would look like in the case of #609? For capabilities["mutable arrays"] == True, we use the NumPy syntax x[i] += y. For capabilities["mutable arrays"] == False, we use ...? This would require standardising a way to do this for immutable arrays, right? Or can we just use xp.where?

[leofang]

Several parts of the Array API standard assume that array objects are mutable.

This is very surprising. It would be nice if we can have a list of such occurrences here, because this was not supposed to happen as per our design guideline https://data-apis.org/array-api/latest/design_topics/copies_views_and_mutation.html

[jakevdp]

This is very surprising. It would be nice if we can have a list of such occurrences here,

The main example is __setitem__, which as far as I can tell is supported in the standard.

For (3), could you prototype what it would look like in the case of gh-609?

For example, it could look something like this in the specific case of updating an array with a mask and a scalar:

info =  xp.__array_namespace_info__().capabilities()

if info['mutable arrays']:
  x[xp.isnan(x)] = 0
else:
  x = xp.where(xp.isnan(x), 0, x)

That would certainly not cover all cases, but it would be enough to fix a large number of the incompatibilities being currently introduced into scipy and scikit-learn.

But in general, yes, it would also be beneficial if the array API standard could add some syntax for out-of-place array updates similar to what's being discussed in #609.

[pearu]

Adding "mutable arrays" to library level capabilities is sub-optimal for libraries that support both mutable and immutable arrays. For example, numpy arrays have flags.writable attribute bit that signals if an array should be considered as mutable or immutable.
What about adding an array object level flags to Array API, something similar to numpy.ndarray.flags?

[rgommers]

Agreed with @pearu's comment. There are multiple other issues here though, for example:

(1) What does it mean to be a "mutable array"? To stay with the numpy.ndarray.flags example:

>>> import numpy as np
>>> x = np.arange(5)
>>> y = x[:3]
>>> y.flags.writeable = False
>>> y += 1
...
ValueError: output array is read-only

>>> y[0]
np.int64(0)
>>> x += 1
>>> y[0]
np.int64(1)

So is y mutable? I guess you'd have said no - but its values can still easily change. So there's no right answer here for numpy.ndarray right now.

(2) JAX you'd argue is immutable I'm sure, however as we saw in the example above numpy readonly arrays reject in-place operators like += while JAX doesn't:

>>> import jax.numpy as jnp
>>> x = jnp.arange(5)
>>> x[0]
Array(0, dtype=int32)
>>> x += 1
>>> x[0]
Array(1, dtype=int32)

So I'd say "is a mutable array" is quite ambiguous.

This is very surprising. It would be nice if we can have a list of such occurrences here,

The main example is __setitem__, which as far as I can tell is supported in the standard.

__setitem__ is the one and only painful example for JAX here I believe, however it is not the case that it cannot be implemented in JAX. Nor that it's incompatible with immutability. It's a complex topic, but https://data-apis.org/array-api/latest/design_topics/copies_views_and_mutation.html covers it. The key point is that there's no semantic difference between updating values in-place or out-of-place as long as the update modifies only a single array. The reason JAX never implemented slice/item assignment (with discussions going all the way back to #24) is that doing so would be confusing given the mismatch in semantics with NumPy. But it's NumPy semantics that are undefined behavior as soon as views play a role, the JAX design is perfectly fine.

---

I think that we should not add .flags unless there's a real value-add. At the moment, the motivating code example is best written for one or more specific libraries like:

if is_jax(x):
  x[xp.isnan(x)] = 0
else:
  x = xp.where(xp.isnan(x), 0, x)

[pearu]

(1) ... So is y mutable? I guess you'd have said no

Yes, y is not mutable because you cannot mutate it via operations on y.

• but its values can still easily change.

In general, there exists always ways to mutate data of immutable objects. One can even mutate JAX arrays easily via dlpack or array interface protocols.

In this specific case, the example demonstrates a common practice of viewing data as read-only while the data could still be modified at some other level or time. For instance, one can open a file in read-only mode and in this context the file descriptor would represent an immutable object while some other process may open the same file in a writable mode which would enable mutations.

(2) JAX you'd argue is immutable I'm sure, however as we saw in the example above numpy readonly arrays reject in-place operators like += while JAX doesn't:

This means that numpy and JAX implement different semantics for in-place operations: for numpy, in-place operation is a mutable operation while for JAX, the in-place operation is a syntactic sugar for transformations: x = op(x, y).

So I'd say "is a mutable array" is quite ambiguous.

I'd disagree. By definition, an "array" is a certain view of (contiguous) data that elements can be accessed via indexing operation.
So, a mutable/immutable array is an array that allows/disallows data mutations via indexing operations. Even if there exists other ways for mutating underlying data (say, via direct memory access, via cosmic rays, etc), these mutation will happen out of context of mutable/immutable arrays usages.

...

You probably meant to write:

if not is_jax(x):
  x[xp.isnan(x)] = 0
else:
  x = xp.where(xp.isnan(x), 0, x)

I find using "jax" in the name of utility predicate function suboptimal because JAX arrays are not the only array objects that are immutable. So, instead of introducing is_jax, I suggest:

if is_mutable(x):
  x[xp.isnan(x)] = 0
else:
  x = xp.where(xp.isnan(x), 0, x)

so that the same code in scipy/... will not be needed to be modified when one invents another Array API compliant array object that is immutable: it will be sufficient to update only the definition of is_mutable.

[lucascolley]

if is_mutable(x):

The problem is that we now need to fetch a capability of the array, rather than the array namespace, since NumPy has both behaviours. So what way could we address this if not for an info or flags method on arrays (or simply refusing to handle immutable NumPy arrays correctly)?