Weird behaviour initializing a numpy array of string data

Question

I am having some seemingly trivial trouble with numpy when the array contains string data. I have the following code:

my_array = numpy.empty([1, 2], dty         


        

Answer 1

Another alternative is to initialize as follows:

my_array = np.array([["CAT","APPLE"],['','']], dtype=str)

In other words, first you write a regular array with what you want, then you turn it into a numpy array. However, this will fix your max string length to the length of the longest string at initialization. So if you were to add

my_array[1,0] = 'PINEAPPLE'

then the string stored would be 'PINEA'.