>>> a = np.array([1, 2, 6, 4, 2, 3, 2]) >>> u, indices = np.unique(a, return_inverse=True) >>> u array([1, 2, 3, 4, 6]) >>> indices array([0, 1, 4, 3, 1, 2, 1]) >>> u[indices] array([1, 2, 6, 4, 2, 3, 2])