Assigns a dictionary keys to the columns of a numpy array

dictionarize_array.py

def dictionarizearray(x,list_of_columns):
    """
    Assigns a dictionary key to each of the m-columns
    of the (n,m) x array

    EXAMPLE in some code which loads this function:
    >>> names=['var1','var2',...,'varN']
    >>> xnames=dictionarizearray(x,names)
    >>> xmask=x[xnames['var1']<xnames['var2']]
    #instead of
    >>> xmask=x[x[:,0]<x[:,1]]
    """
    import numpy as np
    import sys
    x=np.asarray(x)
    if not len(x.shape)==2:
        sys.exit('ERROR: Not a two-dimensional array')

    if x.shape[1]!=len(list_of_columns):
        sys.exit('ERROR: Wrong number of dictionary keys')
        
    dictx={}
    for i in range(len(list_of_columns)):
        dictx[list_of_columns[i]]=x[:,i]

    return dictx