numpy.ndarray.byteswap

method

ndarray.byteswap(inplace=False)

Swap the bytes of the array elements

Toggle between low-endian and big-endian data representation by returning a byteswapped array, optionally swapped in-place. Arrays of byte-strings are not swapped. The real and imaginary parts of a complex number are swapped individually.

Parameters

inplacebool, optional

If True, swap bytes in-place, default is False.

Returns

outndarray

The byteswapped array. If inplace is True, this is a view to self.

Examples

>>> A = np.array([1, 256, 8755], dtype=np.int16)
>>> list(map(hex, A))
['0x1', '0x100', '0x2233']
>>> A.byteswap(inplace=True)
array([  256,     1, 13090], dtype=int16)
>>> list(map(hex, A))
['0x100', '0x1', '0x3322']

Arrays of byte-strings are not swapped

>>> A = np.array([b'ceg', b'fac'])
>>> A.byteswap()
array([b'ceg', b'fac'], dtype='|S3')

A.newbyteorder().byteswap() produces an array with the same values

but different representation in memory

>>> A = np.array([1, 2, 3])
>>> A.view(np.uint8)
array([1, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 2, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 3, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0,
       0, 0], dtype=uint8)
>>> A.newbyteorder().byteswap(inplace=True)
array([1, 2, 3])
>>> A.view(np.uint8)
array([0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 1, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 2, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0,
       0, 3], dtype=uint8)