python pandas: how to calculate derivative/gradient

Question

Given that I have the following two vectors:

In [99]: time_index
Out[99]: 
[1484942413,
 1484942712,
 1484943012,
 1484943312,
 1484943612,
 1484943912,
 1484944         


        

Answer 1

A naive explanation would be that diff literally subtracts following entries while np.gradient uses a central difference scheme.