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I need some help with dplyr. I have two data frames - one huge, with several time series A,B,... in there (LargeDF), and a second one (Categories) with time intervals (left and right boundaries).

I would like to add another column to LargeDF, labeled leftBoundary, containing the appropriate boundary value, like so:

LargeDF
   ts timestamp   signal     # left_boundary
1   A 0.3209338 10.43279     # 0
2   A 1.4791524 10.34295     # 1
3   A 2.6007494 10.71601     # 2

and

Categories
   ts left right
1   A    0     1
2   A    1     2
3   A    2     3

My code I came up with is

LargeDF %>%
  group_by(ts) %>%
  do(myFUN(., Categories))

# calls this ...
myFUN <- function(Large, Categ) {
  CategTS <- Categ %>%
    filter(ts == Large[1, "ts"][[1]])

  Large %>%
    group_by(timestamp) %>%  # this is bothering me...
    mutate(left_boundary = CategTS$left[CategTS$left < timestamp 
                                         & timestamp < CategTS$right])
}

but it is super slow for large time series. I would really like to lose the group_by(timestamp), as they are unique within each ts anyways.

Does someone see a better solution? That would be much appreciated.

# Code for making the example data frames ...
library("dplyr")
n <- 10; series <- c("A", "B", "C")
LargeDF <- data.frame(
    ts        = rep(series, each = n)
  , timestamp = runif(n*length(series), max = 4)
  , signal    = runif(n*length(series), min = 10, max = 11)
) %>% group_by(ts) %>% arrange(timestamp)

m <- 7
Categories <- data.frame(
    ts    = rep(series, each = m)
  , left  = rep(seq(1 : m) - 1, length(series))
  , right = rep(seq(1 : m), length(series))
)

Update (data.table and my slightly modified mockup)

So, I tried the suggestions from @DavidArenburg on a quick/dirty mockup-example first, but had the problem that some timestamps were binned twice (into successive categories/intervals).

> foverlaps(d, c, type="any", by.x = c("timestamp", "timestamp2"))
    left right     value timestamp timestamp2
 1:  0.9   1.9 0.1885459         1          1
 2:  0.9   1.9 0.0542375         2          2  # binned here
 3:  1.9   2.9 0.0542375         2          2  # and here as well
13: 19.9  25.9 0.4579986        20         20

I then read about minoverlap = 1L as a default and realized that a normal timestamp is >> 1.

> as.numeric(Sys.time())
[1] 1429022267

Therefore, if I shifted everything to larger values (e.g. n <- 10 in the example below), everything went fine.

   left right      value timestamp timestamp2
1:    9    19 0.64971126        10         10
2:   19    29 0.75994751        20         20
3:   29    99 0.98276462        30         30
9:  199   259 0.89816165       200        200

With my real data, everything went smoothly, so thanks again.

## Code for my data.table example -----
n <- 1
d <- data.table( value     = runif(9),
                 timestamp = c(1, 2, 3, 5, 7, 10, 15, 18, 20)*n,
                timestamp2 = c(1, 2, 3, 5, 7, 10, 15, 18, 20)*n)
c <- data.table(left  = c(0.9, 1.9, 2.9,  9.9, 19.9, 25.9)*n,
                right = c(1.9, 2.9, 9.9, 19.9, 25.9, 33.9)*n)
setkey(c, left, right)
foverlaps(d, c, type="any", by.x = c("timestamp", "timestamp2"))

Update 2 (JOIN, then FILTER, within dplyr)

I tested the suggestion from @aosmith to use the dplyr function left_join() to create one (very) large DF, then filter() this again. Very quickly, I ran into memory issues:

Error: std::bad_alloc

Probably, this approach would be a good idea for smaller tables - as the syntax is very nice (but this, again, is personal preference). I'll go for the data.table solution in this case. Thanks again for all suggestions.

Wordsmyth
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1 Answers1

5

dplyr isn't suitable for such operations, try data.tables foverlaps functions instead

library(data.table)
class(LargeDF) <- "data.frame" ## Removing all the dplyr classes
setDT(LargeDF)[, `:=`(left = timestamp, right = timestamp)] # creating min and max boundaries in the large table
setkey(setDT(Categories)) # keying by all columns (necessary for `foverlaps` to work)
LargeDF[, left_boundary := foverlaps(LargeDF, Categories)$left][] # Creating left_boundary 
#    ts  timestamp   signal       left      right left_boundary
# 1:  A 0.46771516 10.72175 0.46771516 0.46771516             0
# 2:  A 0.58841492 10.35459 0.58841492 0.58841492             0
# 3:  A 1.14494484 10.50301 1.14494484 1.14494484             1
# 4:  A 1.18298225 10.82431 1.18298225 1.18298225             1
# 5:  A 1.69822678 10.04780 1.69822678 1.69822678             1
# 6:  A 1.83189609 10.75001 1.83189609 1.83189609             1
# 7:  A 1.90947475 10.94715 1.90947475 1.90947475             1
# 8:  A 2.73305266 10.14449 2.73305266 2.73305266             2
# 9:  A 3.02371968 10.17724 3.02371968 3.02371968             3
# ...
David Arenburg
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    Thanks for the clear answer! I will read these posts more thoroughly, then: (http://stackoverflow.com/questions/21435339) and (http://stackoverflow.com/questions/27511604) – Wordsmyth Apr 14 '15 at 07:59
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    NP, take a look at [the vignettes](https://github.com/Rdatatable/data.table/wiki/Getting-started) too. – David Arenburg Apr 14 '15 at 09:08