Break all the User Unfriendly API (and replace them with better ones) about gorgonia HOT 10 OPEN

I admit to initially being confused about NewMatrix/Vector - you're right that it does not intuitively suggest node creation. How about having all those routines begin with NewNodeFrom... and NewNodeOf... ?

x:= NewNodeOfVector(g, Float64, 5, WithName("x"))
y:= NewNodeFromVector(g, x, WithName("y"))

It is quite verbose, but given that these are among the first functions any (new) user would have to call, making them easy to understand might be worth it.

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Changed

x := IsAVector(g, Float64, 5, WithName("x"))
y := IsAMatrix(g, Flaot32, 2, 3, WithName("y"), WithValue(yT))

to

x := Vector(g, Float64, 5, WithName("x"))
y := Matrix(g, Flaot32, 2, 3, WithName("y"), WithValue(yT))

Reason: IsAVector looks like it should return a bool and is hence confusing.
Cons: now it looks like what I really don't like: Theano's syntax.

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I like the idea of NewNodeOf. Clean. Explains itself well. As for the one that has "from"... I think adopting the NodeFromXXX pattern would be cleaner - drop the "the" "new

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Changed

x := Vector(g, Float64, 5, WithName("x"))
y := Matrix(g, Flaot32, 2, 3, WithName("y"), WithValue(yT))

to

x := NewNodeOfVector(g, Float64, 5, WithName("x"))
y := NewNodeOfMatrix(g, Float32, 2, 3, WithName("y"), WithValue(yT))

or

x := NodeOfVector(g, Float64, 5, WithName("x"))
y := NodeOfMatrix(g, Float32, 2, 3, WithName("y"), WithValue(yT))

@kabaka0 made some very good points in the comments above.

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Would it be possible to unify the node creation functions into something like NewNodeFromTensor? Then, for instance, a scalar would just be a 1x1 tensor. Is there any reason why the functions to create a "matrix node" are separate from those that create a "tensor node" or a "scalar node"? Maybe it's a naive question, since I am totally new to the library ;-)

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https://godoc.org/gorgonia.org/gorgonia#NodeFromAny

Also the reason for having Scalar value vs Scalar represented as a tensor.Tensor type is that the usual tensor.Tensor is tensor.Dense, which requires A LOT of allocation.

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Ok, thanks for clarifying this. So, in principle I guess I could always use NodeFromAny to create a scalar-matrix-tensor node, since it takes care of calling the appropriate NewScalar or NewTensor functions. I understand that it's better to have a dedicated function to build scalar nodes (instead of representing them as tensors) for memory allocation, but if I understand correctly, NewMatrix and NewVector are just wrappers for NewTensor, so they are separate functions just for convenience, not to save memory.

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NewMatrix and NewVector are just wrappers for NewTensor, so they are separate functions just for convenience, not to save memory.

Specifically the convenience is not having to specify how many dimensions

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Good. Do you think it would be worth explaining the rationale behind these functions somewhere in the gorgonia.org website?

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OH YES!

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