background
When reading the book Machine learning in Action, I noticed that when the author used package Numpy, he used a rare function/method named mat(). This is a method I have never seen before. So let’s check the document in Python by using help():
>>>import numpy as np
>>>help(np.mat)
Then the result showing on the screen is:
Help on function asmatrix in module numpy.matrixlib.defmatrix:
asmatrix(data, dtype=None)
Interpret the input as a matrix.
Unlike `matrix`, `asmatrix` does not make a copy if the input is already
a matrix or an ndarray. Equivalent to ``matrix(data, copy=False)``.
Parameters
----------
data : array_like
Input data.
Returns
-------
mat : matrix
`data` interpreted as a matrix.
Examples
--------
>>> x = np.array([[1, 2], [3, 4]])
>>> m = np.asmatrix(x)
After that, let’s try some other examples:
In [19]: a = [[1,2],[3,4]]
In [20]: a
Out[20]: [[1, 2], [3, 4]]
In [21]: np.mat(a)
Out[21]:
matrix([[1, 2],
[3, 4]])
In [22]: b = np.mat(a)
In [23]: b
Out[23]:
matrix([[1, 2],
[3, 4]])
In [24]: b[0,0] = 5
In [25]: b
Out[25]:
matrix([[5, 2],
[3, 4]])
In [26]: a
Out[26]: [[1, 2], [3, 4]]