# Adding a symbolic layer to fluid.datasets~

**URL:** https://discourse.flucoma.org/t/adding-a-symbolic-layer-to-fluid-datasets/799
**Category:** Toolbox 2 Improvement Ideas
**Created:** [March 2, 2021, 12:53am UTC](https://discourse.flucoma.org/t/adding-a-symbolic-layer-to-fluid-datasets/799 "2021-03-02T00:53:55Z")
**Posts on this page:** 1
**Showing post:** 3

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### Author: ![rodrigo.constanzo](https://discourse.flucoma.org/user_avatar/discourse.flucoma.org/rodrigo.constanzo/32/12_2.png) [@rodrigo.constanzo](https://discourse.flucoma.org/u/rodrigo.constanzo)
#### Post date: [March 2, 2021, 11:19am UTC](https://discourse.flucoma.org/t/adding-a-symbolic-layer-to-fluid-datasets/799/3 "2021-03-02T11:19:42Z")

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> [@weefuzzy](#):
>
> column labels in datasets

That would be great if they were intrinsic to datasets. They can be ignored for “long flat generic all numbers” matching, but if you’re wanting to know and/or thin things out, it would be unimaginably game changing.

> [@weefuzzy](#):
>
> something for `buf*` processors that would provide channel / index labels

For the descriptor-based stuff, either the ability to choose what you want so it’s less of an issue in the first place (`@output centroid` → `@output mean`, so you have one number and that’s that) or perhaps a `dump` output/message that lets you know what’s what. This becomes more useful/significant when you get to multichannel audio and/or the stats/flattening stages.

> [@weefuzzy](#):
>
> by the end of which the labelling fairy has kept track of what’s happened and is able to provide a lookup that knows that (say) channel 0, frame 0 of something is the mean of MFCC 0

Don’t threaten me with a good time!

I guess what I’m saying is at the moment this stuff is being kept track of anyways. It’s just via channels and indices, which are unpleasant for (most) humans to parse. It’s not like each of these processes (descriptors-\>stats-\>select-\>flatten) are putting numbers in random orders (which would still work in an ML context). The order/position/orientation are all known. I guess I’m craving a way to know what that is that doesn’t require counting indices.

> [@weefuzzy](#):
>
> Which, computationally, is all simple enough but interface-wise is far from it, in terms of not adding overly to the cost / complexity of analysis chains, or unintentionally restricting flexibility.

A lot of the interface problems emerge from the fact that buffers (and datasets) can only contain numbers, so the interface “problems” have to work around that (initial) interface decision. Otherwise it would be (potentially) part of the native data structure.

That being said, this can be something that is offered as a flag or as part of an initial dataset creation (and perhaps ignored for buf-based processes, unless you use a `dump` message as I suggest above, which can just not do for realtime use).

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