Convert pandas to dask code and it errors out - pandas

Question

I have pandas code which works perfectly.
import pandas as pd
courses_df = pd.DataFrame(
[
["Jay", "MS"],
["Jay", "Music"],
["Dorsey", "Music"],
["Dorsey", "Piano"],
["Mark", "MS"],
],
columns=["Name", "Course"],
)
pandas_df_json = (
courses_df.groupby(["Name"])
.apply(lambda x: x.drop(columns="Name").to_json(orient="records"))
.reset_index(name="courses_json")
)
But when I convert the dataframe to Dask and try the same operation.
from dask import dataframe as dd
df = dd.from_pandas(courses_df, npartitions=2)
df.groupby(["Name"]).apply(lambda x: x.to_json(orient="records")).reset_index(
name="courses_json"
).compute()
And the error i get is
UserWarning: `meta` is not specified, inferred from partial data. Please provide `meta` if the result is unexpected.
Before: .apply(func)
After: .apply(func, meta={'x': 'f8', 'y': 'f8'}) for dataframe result
or: .apply(func, meta=('x', 'f8')) for series result
df.groupby(["Name"]).apply(lambda x: x.to_json(orient="records")).reset_index(
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
TypeError Traceback (most recent call last)
Input In [37], in <module>
1 from dask import dataframe as dd
3 df = dd.from_pandas(courses_df, npartitions=2)
----> 4 df.groupby(["Name"]).apply(lambda x: x.drop(columns="Name").to_json(orient="records")).reset_index(
5 name="courses_json"
6 ).compute()
TypeError: _Frame.reset_index() got an unexpected keyword argument 'name'
My expected output from dask and pandas should be same that is
Name courses_json
0 Dorsey [{"Course":"Music"},{"Course":"Piano"}]
1 Jay [{"Course":"MS"},{"Course":"Music"}]
2 Mark [{"Course":"MS"}]
How do i achieve this in dask ?
My try so far
from dask import dataframe as dd
df = dd.from_pandas(courses_df, npartitions=2)
df.groupby(["Name"]).apply(
lambda x: x.drop(columns="Name").to_json(orient="records")
).compute()
UserWarning: `meta` is not specified, inferred from partial data. Please provide `meta` if the result is unexpected.
Before: .apply(func)
After: .apply(func, meta={'x': 'f8', 'y': 'f8'}) for dataframe result
or: .apply(func, meta=('x', 'f8')) for series result
df.groupby(["Name"]).apply(
Out[57]:
Name
Dorsey [{"Course":"Piano"},{"Course":"Music"}]
Jay [{"Course":"MS"},{"Course":"Music"}]
Mark [{"Course":"MS"}]
dtype: object
I want to pass in a meta arguement and also want the second column
to have a meaningful name like courses_json

Answer 1

For the meta warning, Dask is expecting you to specify the column datatypes for the result. It's optional, but if you do not specify this it's entirely possible that Dask may infer faulty datatypes. One partition could for example be inferred as an int type and another as a float. This is particularly the case for sparse datasets. See the docs page for more details:
https://docs.dask.org/en/stable/generated/dask.dataframe.DataFrame.apply.html
This should solve the warning:
from dask import dataframe as dd
df = dd.from_pandas(courses_df, npartitions=2)
new_df = df.groupby(["Name"]).apply(
lambda x: x.drop(columns="Name").to_json(orient="records"),
meta=("Name", "O")
).to_frame()
# rename columns
new_df.columns = ["courses_json"]
# use numeric int index instead of name as in the given example
new_df = new_df.reset_index()
new_df.compute()
The result of your computation is a dask Series, not a Dataframe. This is why you need to use numpy types here (https://www.w3schools.com/python/numpy/numpy_data_types.asp). It consists of an index and a value. And you're not directly able to name the second column without converting it back to a dataframe using the .to_frame() method.