Special handling of "0:root" labels in deps column

I recently upgraded from conllu 1.3.1 to 2.2 due to the latter version’s ability to deal with elided tokens/copy nodes (e.g. token 8.1 below) which was addressed in https://github.com/EmilStenstrom/conllu/issues/27.

I am parsing the deps column and have a loop which iterates over the deps tuples to put the heads into a heads list and the relations into a relations list. The upgrade now includes the copy nodes which is good but now all 0:root labels are returned as a string and not a tuple which breaks my loop.

# sent_id = weblog-blogspot.com_healingiraq_20040409053012_ENG_20040409_053012-0022
# text = Over 300 Iraqis are reported dead and 500 wounded in Fallujah alone.
1	Over	over	ADV	RB	_	2	advmod	2:advmod	_
2	300	300	NUM	CD	NumType=Card	3	nummod	3:nummod	_
3	Iraqis	Iraqis	PROPN	NNPS	Number=Plur	5	nsubj:pass	5:nsubj:pass|6:nsubj:xsubj|8:nsubj:pass	_
4	are	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	5	aux:pass	5:aux:pass	_
5	reported	report	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	0:root	_
6	dead	dead	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	5	xcomp	5:xcomp	_
7	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	8	cc	8:cc|8.1:cc	_
8	500	500	NUM	CD	NumType=Card	5	conj	5:conj:and|8.1:nsubj:pass|9:nsubj:xsubj	_
8.1	reported	report	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	_	_	5:conj:and	CopyOf=5
9	wounded	wounded	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	8	orphan	8.1:xcomp	_
10	in	in	ADP	IN	_	11	case	11:case	_
11	Fallujah	Fallujah	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	5	obl	5:obl:in	_
12	alone	alone	ADV	RB	_	11	advmod	11:advmod	SpaceAfter=No
13	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	5:punct	_

I’m just wondering is this the desired behaviour? e.g. the output of deps looks like:

deps [[('advmod', 2)], [('nummod', 3)], [('nsubj:pass', 5), ('nsubj:xsubj', 6), ('nsubj:pass', 8)], [('aux:pass', 5)], '0:root', [('xcomp', 5)], [('cc', 8), ('cc', (8, '.', 1))], [('conj:and', 5), ('nsubj:pass', (8, '.', 1)), ('nsubj:xsubj', 9)], [('conj:and', 5)], [('xcomp', (8, '.', 1))], [('case', 11)], [('obl:in', 5)], [('advmod', 11)], [('punct', 5)]]

Is there any particular reason why '0:root' shouldn’t be [('root', 0)]?

Thanks!

[EmilStenstrom]

@Jbar-ry Thank you! I just released 2.2.1 with fixes this bug! Install it with pip install -U conllu.

[jbrry]

Thanks a lot @EmilStenstrom!