Two functions for working with circular data

circ.py

import numpy as np

def circmean(alpha,axis=None):
    mean_angle = np.arctan2(np.mean(np.sin(alpha),axis),np.mean(np.cos(alpha),axis))
    return mean_angle
    
def circvar(alpha,axis=None):
    if np.ma.isMaskedArray(alpha) and alpha.mask.shape!=():
        N = np.sum(~alpha.mask,axis)
    else:
        if axis is None:
            N = alpha.size
        else:
            N = alpha.shape[axis]
    R = np.sqrt(np.sum(np.sin(alpha),axis)**2 + np.sum(np.cos(alpha),axis)**2)/N
    V = 1-R
    return V

really just a test of gists and how easy it is to embed them in blogger.