# spacepy.toolbox.hypot

`spacepy.toolbox.``hypot`(*args)

  compute the N-dimensional hypot of an iterable or many arguments

  Parameters
    args many numbers or array-like

      array like or many inputs to compute from

  Returns
    out float

      N-dimensional hypot of a number

  Notes

  This function has a complicated speed function.

    - if a numpy array of floats is input this is passed off to C

    - if iterables are passed in they are made into numpy arrays and comptaton is done local

    - if many scalar agruments are passed in calculation is done in a loop

  For max speed:
    - <20 elements expand them into scalars

            >>> tb.hypot(*vals)
            >>> tb.hypot(vals[0], vals[1]...) #alternate

    - >20 elements premake them into a numpy array of doubles

  Examples

      >>> from spacepy import toolbox as tb
      >>> print tb.hypot([3,4])
      5.0
      >>> print tb.hypot(3,4)
      5.0
      >>> # Benchmark ####
      >>> from spacepy import toolbox as tb
      >>> import numpy as np
      >>> import timeit
      >>> num_list = []
      >>> num_np = []
      >>> num_np_double = []
      >>> num_scalar = []
      >>> tot = 500
      >>> for num in tb.logspace(1, tot, 10):
      >>>     print num
      >>>     num_list.append(timeit.timeit(stmt='tb.hypot(a)',
                              setup='from spacepy import toolbox as tb;
                              import numpy as np; a = [3]*{0}'.format(int(num)), number=10000))
      >>>     num_np.append(timeit.timeit(stmt='tb.hypot(a)',
                            setup='from spacepy import toolbox as tb;
                            import numpy as np; a = np.asarray([3]*{0})'.format(int(num)), number=10000))
      >>>     num_scalar.append(timeit.timeit(stmt='tb.hypot(*a)',
                                setup='from spacepy import toolbox as tb;
                                import numpy as np; a = [3]*{0}'.format(int(num)), number=10000))
      >>> from pylab import *
      >>> loglog(tb.logspace(1, tot, 10),  num_list, lw=2, label='list')
      >>> loglog(tb.logspace(1, tot, 10),  num_np, lw=2, label='numpy->ctypes')
      >>> loglog(tb.logspace(1, tot, 10),  num_scalar, lw=2, label='scalar')
      >>> legend(shadow=True, fancybox=1, loc='upper left')
      >>> title('Different hypot times for 10000 runs')
      >>> ylabel('Time [s]')
      >>> xlabel('Size')