Updating documentation

GH21220

Author: KalyanGokhale

doc/source/merging.rst

@@ -531,40 +531,40 @@ all standard database join operations between ``DataFrame`` objects:
              suffixes=('_x', '_y'), copy=True, indicator=False,
              validate=None)
 
-- ``left``: A DataFrame object.
-- ``right``: Another DataFrame object.
+- ``left``: A DataFrame or named Series object.
+- ``right``: Another DataFrame or named Series object.
 - ``on``: Column or index level names to join on. Must be found in both the left
-  and right DataFrame objects. If not passed and ``left_index`` and
+  and right DataFrame and/or Series objects. If not passed and ``left_index`` and
   ``right_index`` are ``False``, the intersection of the columns in the
-  DataFrames will be inferred to be the join keys.
-- ``left_on``: Columns or index levels from the left DataFrame to use as
+  DataFrames and/or Series will be inferred to be the join keys.
+- ``left_on``: Columns or index levels from the left DataFrame or Series to use as
   keys. Can either be column names, index level names, or arrays with length
-  equal to the length of the DataFrame.
-- ``right_on``: Columns or index levels from the right DataFrame to use as
+  equal to the length of the DataFrame or Series.
+- ``right_on``: Columns or index levels from the right DataFrame or Series to use as
   keys. Can either be column names, index level names, or arrays with length
-  equal to the length of the DataFrame.
+  equal to the length of the DataFrame or Series.
 - ``left_index``: If ``True``, use the index (row labels) from the left
-  DataFrame as its join key(s). In the case of a DataFrame with a MultiIndex
+  DataFrame or Series as its join key(s). In the case of a DataFrame or Series with a MultiIndex
   (hierarchical), the number of levels must match the number of join keys
-  from the right DataFrame.
-- ``right_index``: Same usage as ``left_index`` for the right DataFrame
+  from the right DataFrame or Series.
+- ``right_index``: Same usage as ``left_index`` for the right DataFrame or Series
 - ``how``: One of ``'left'``, ``'right'``, ``'outer'``, ``'inner'``. Defaults
   to ``inner``. See below for more detailed description of each method.
 - ``sort``: Sort the result DataFrame by the join keys in lexicographical
   order. Defaults to ``True``, setting to ``False`` will improve performance
   substantially in many cases.
 - ``suffixes``: A tuple of string suffixes to apply to overlapping
   columns. Defaults to ``('_x', '_y')``.
-- ``copy``: Always copy data (default ``True``) from the passed DataFrame
+- ``copy``: Always copy data (default ``True``) from the passed DataFrame or named Series
   objects, even when reindexing is not necessary. Cannot be avoided in many
   cases but may improve performance / memory usage. The cases where copying
   can be avoided are somewhat pathological but this option is provided
   nonetheless.
 - ``indicator``: Add a column to the output DataFrame called ``_merge``
   with information on the source of each row. ``_merge`` is Categorical-type
   and takes on a value of ``left_only`` for observations whose merge key
-  only appears in ``'left'`` DataFrame, ``right_only`` for observations whose
-  merge key only appears in ``'right'`` DataFrame, and ``both`` if the
+  only appears in ``'left'`` DataFrame or Series, ``right_only`` for observations whose
+  merge key only appears in ``'right'`` DataFrame or Series, and ``both`` if the
   observation's merge key is found in both.
 
 - ``validate`` : string, default None.
@@ -584,9 +584,10 @@ all standard database join operations between ``DataFrame`` objects:
 
    Support for specifying index levels as the ``on``, ``left_on``, and
    ``right_on`` parameters was added in version 0.23.0.
+   Support for merging named ``Series`` objects was added in version 0.24.0.
 
-The return type will be the same as ``left``. If ``left`` is a ``DataFrame``
-and ``right`` is a subclass of DataFrame, the return type will still be
+The return type will be the same as ``left``. If ``left`` is a ``DataFrame`` or named ``Series``
+and ``right`` is a subclass of ``DataFrame``, the return type will still be
 ``DataFrame``.
 
 ``merge`` is a function in the pandas namespace, and it is also available as a

pandas/core/frame.py

@@ -135,16 +135,16 @@
 """
 
 _merge_doc = """
-Merge DataFrame objects by performing a database-style join operation by
-columns or indexes.
+Merge DataFrame or named Series objects by performing a database-style join
+operation by columns or indexes.
 
 If joining columns on columns, the DataFrame indexes *will be
 ignored*. Otherwise if joining indexes on indexes or indexes on a column or
 columns, the index will be passed on.
 
 Parameters
 ----------%s
-right : DataFrame
+right : DataFrame or named Series
 how : {'left', 'right', 'outer', 'inner'}, default 'inner'
     * left: use only keys from left frame, similar to a SQL left outer join;
       preserve key order
@@ -208,6 +208,7 @@
 -----
 Support for specifying index levels as the `on`, `left_on`, and
 `right_on` parameters was added in version 0.23.0
+Support for merging named Series objects was added in version 0.24.0
 
 Examples
 --------