The pandas DataFrame

Before diving deep into pandas, it is worth knowing the components of the DataFrame. Visually, the outputted display of a pandas DataFrame (in a Jupyter Notebook) appears to be nothing more than an ordinary table of data consisting of rows and columns. Hiding beneath the surface are the three components—the index, columns, and data that you must be aware of to maximize the DataFrame's full potential.

This recipe reads in the movie dataset into a pandas DataFrame and provides a labeled diagram of all its major components.

>>> movies = pd.read_csv("data/movie.csv")
>>> movies
      color        direc/_name  ...  aspec/ratio  movie/likes
0     Color      James Cameron  ...         1.78        33000
1     Color     Gore Verbinski  ...         2.35            0
2     Color         Sam Mendes  ...         2.35        85000
3     Color  Christopher Nolan  ...         2.35       164000
4       NaN        Doug Walker  .....