add Prior class
@@ -376,4 +376,22 @@ class VarComp(Term):
class Prior(object):
- pass
+ '''Abstract specification of a term prior.
+
+ Parameters
+ ----------
+ name : str
+ Name of prior distribution (e.g., Normal, Bernoulli, etc.)
+ kwargs: dict
+ Optional keywords specifying the parameters of the named distribution.
+
+ Notes
+ -----
+ At present there's no controlled vocabulary of supported prior names and
+ arguments, but users implementing new Bayesian estimators are encouraged to
+ use the names used in PyMC3 (e.g., 'Normal', parameterized with mu and
+ sd arguments).
+ '''
+ def __init__(self, name, **kwargs):
+ self.name = name
+ self.kwargs = kwargs
