# cf.Constructs.equals¶

Constructs.equals(**kwargs)[source]

Whether two Constructs instances are the same.

Two real numbers x and y are considered equal if |x-y|<=atol+rtol|y|, where atol (the tolerance on absolute differences) and rtol (the tolerance on relative differences) are positive, typically very small numbers. See the atol and rtol parameters.

Any compression is ignored by default, with only the arrays in their uncompressed forms being compared. See the ignore_compression parameter.

Any type of object may be tested but equality is only possible with another Constructs construct, or a subclass of one.

NetCDF elements, such as netCDF variable and dimension names, do not constitute part of the CF data model and so are not checked.

New in version (cfdm): 1.7.0

Parameters
other:

The object to compare for equality.

atol: number, optional

The tolerance on absolute differences between real numbers. The default value is set by the cfdm.atol function.

rtol: number, optional

The tolerance on relative differences between real numbers. The default value is set by the cfdm.rtol function.

ignore_fill_value: bool, optional

If True then the _FillValue and missing_value properties are omitted from the comparison for the metadata constructs.

ignore_data_type: bool, optional

If True then ignore the data types in all numerical comparisons. By default different numerical data types imply inequality, regardless of whether the elements are within the tolerance for equality.

ignore_compression: bool, optional

If False then the compression type and, if applicable, the underlying compressed arrays must be the same, as well as the arrays in their uncompressed forms. By default only the the arrays in their uncompressed forms are compared.

verbose: int or str or None, optional

If an integer from -1 to 3, or an equivalent string equal ignoring case to one of:

• 'DISABLE' (0)

• 'WARNING' (1)

• 'INFO' (2)

• 'DETAIL' (3)

• 'DEBUG' (-1)

set for the duration of the method call only as the minimum cut-off for the verboseness level of displayed output (log) messages, regardless of the globally-configured cfdm.log_level. Note that increasing numerical value corresponds to increasing verbosity, with the exception of -1 as a special case of maximal and extreme verbosity.

Otherwise, if None (the default value), output messages will be shown according to the value of the cfdm.log_level setting.

Overall, the higher a non-negative integer or equivalent string that is set (up to a maximum of 3/'DETAIL') for increasing verbosity, the more description that is printed to convey information about the operation.

Returns
bool

Whether the two instances are equal.

Examples:

>>> x.equals(x)
True
>>> x.equals(x.copy())
True
>>> x.equals('something else')
False