[Gretl-devel] the getinfo() function: request for comments

The getinfo() function, as you know, is used to for retrieving the metadata of a series. For example, the code <hansl> open data4-1 -q b = getinfo(sqft) print b </hansl> returns <output> bundle b: coded = 0 transform = "none" parent = "" discrete = 0 name = "sqft" description = "square feet of living area (Range 1065 - 3000)" lag = 0 has_string_table = 0 </output> The function currently returns an error if applied to a series that is created "on the fly", as in "getinfo(log(sqrt))". This is IMO undesirable, so I was going to modify the function to have it return a bundle anyway. The question is: what should it contain? I was inclined to fill all the slots with "sensible" values, perhaps setting "name" as "anonymous" and "description" with something meaningful if possible. Or should we just return an empty bundle? Would it make sense to include an "anonymous" binary flag? Something else? ------------------------------------------------------- Riccardo (Jack) Lucchetti Dipartimento di Scienze Economiche e Sociali (DiSES) Università Politecnica delle Marche (formerly known as Università di Ancona) r.lucchetti(a)univpm.it http://www2.econ.univpm.it/servizi/hpp/lucchetti -------------------------------------------------------