API: ser[dt64].astype("string") vs ser[dt64]._values.astype("string") · Issue #36153 · pandas-dev/pandas (original) (raw)

ser = pd.Series([pd.NaT, pd.Timestamp.now()])

>>> ser.astype("string")
0                           NaT
1    2020-09-05 16:44:52.259773
dtype: string

>>> pd.Series(ser._values.astype("string"))
0                          <NA>
1    2020-09-05 16:44:52.259773
dtype: string

It would be nice to have the Series code (i.e. the Block.astype) dispatch to the array code.

Note also:

vals = ser._values.astype("string")
>>> vals.astype(ser.dtype)
ValueError: Could not convert object to NumPy datetime

>>> pd.Series(vals, dtype=ser.dtype)
ValueError: Could not convert object to NumPy datetime

>>> pd.to_datetime(vals)  # <-- works