Exception calling to_string on empty Series

[craustin]

from pandas import Series
s = Series({})
s.to_string()

pandas\core\series.pyc in to_string(self, buf,
na_rep, float_format, nanRep)
460 na_rep = nanRep
461
--> 462 the_repr = self._get_repr(float_format=float_format, na_rep=na_rep)
463 if buf is None:
464 return the_repr

pandas\core\series.pyc in _get_repr(self, name, print_header, length, na_rep, float_format)
481 string_index = index.format()
482
--> 483 maxlen = max(len(x) for x in string_index)
484 padSpace = min(maxlen, 60)
485

ValueError: max() arg is an empty sequence

[wesm]

Not obvious what to_string should return in the case of an empty Series. What do you think? Could just default to:

In [4]: repr(s)
Out[4]: 'Series([], dtype=float64)'

Or it could return a length-0 string

[craustin]

I'd say since repr returns Series([],... It could make sense to return that. The way we're using to_string, it'd make sense if it returned an empty string (if the newly-added "length" flag is false.

On Dec 14, 2011, at 11:34 PM, Wes McKinneyreply@reply.github.com wrote:

Not obvious what to_string should return in the case of an empty Series. What do you think? Could just default to:

In [4]: repr(s)
Out[4]: 'Series([], dtype=float64)'

Or it could return a length-0 string

---

Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub:
https://github.com/wesm/pandas/issues/488#issuecomment-3156677

[wesm]

Alright, I'm going with empty string (done in the above commit) :)