I found that plyr:::daply is more efficient than base:::by (am I doing something wrong?), below updated code for comparison (I also fixed a couple things). Function daply from plyr package has also a .parallel argument and I wonder if creating timeseries objects in parallel and then combining them would be faster (Windows XP platform); does someone has experience with this topic? I found only very simple examples about plyr and parallel computations and I do not have a working example for such kind of implementation (daply that return a list of timeseries objects).
Thanks in advance, Daniele Amberti set.seed(123) N <- 10000 X <- data.frame( ID = c(rep(1,N), rep(2,N,), rep(3,N), rep(4,N)), DATE = as.character(rep(as.POSIXct("2000-01-01", tz = "GMT")+ 0:(N-1), 4)), VALUE = runif(N*4), stringsAsFactors = FALSE) X <- X[sample(1:(N*4), N*4),] str(X) library(timeSeries) buildTimeSeriesFromDataFrame <- function(x, env) { { if(exists("xx", envir = env)) assign("xx", cbind(get("xx", env), timeSeries(x$VALUE, x$DATE, format = '%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S', zone = 'GMT', units = as.character(x$ID[1]))), envir = env) else assign("xx", timeSeries(x$VALUE, x$DATE, format = '%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S', zone = 'GMT', units = as.character(x$ID[1])), envir = env) return(TRUE) } } tsBy <- function(...) { e1 <- new.env(parent = baseenv()) res <- by(X, X$ID, buildTimeSeriesFromDataFrame, env = e1, simplify = TRUE) return(get("xx", e1)) } Time01 <- replicate(100, system.time(tsBy(X, X$ID, simplify = TRUE))[[1]]) median(Time01) hist(Time01) ATS <- tsBy(X, X$ID, simplify = TRUE) library(xts) buildXtsFromDataFrame <- function(x, env) { { if(exists("xx", envir = env)) assign("xx", cbind(get("xx", env), xts(x$VALUE, as.POSIXct(x$DATE, tz = "GMT", format = '%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S'), tzone = 'GMT')), envir = env) else assign("xx", xts(x$VALUE, as.POSIXct(x$DATE, tz = "GMT", format = '%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S'), tzone = 'GMT'), envir = env) return(TRUE) } } xtsBy <- function(...) { e1 <- new.env(parent = baseenv()) res <- by(X, X$ID, buildXtsFromDataFrame, env = e1, simplify = TRUE) return(get("xx", e1)) } Time02 <- replicate(100, system.time(xtsBy(X, X$ID,simplify = TRUE))[[1]]) median(Time02) hist(Time02) AXTS <- xtsBy(X, X$ID, simplify = TRUE) plot(density(Time02), col = "red", xlim = c(min(c(Time02, Time01)), max(c(Time02, Time01)))) lines(density(Time01), col = "blue") #check equal, a still a problem with names AXTS2 <- as.timeSeries(AXTS) names(AXTS2) <- names(ATS) identical(getDataPart(ATS), getDataPart(AXTS2)) identical(time(ATS), time(AXTS2)) # with plyr library and daply instead of by: library(plyr) tsDaply <- function(...) { e1 <- new.env(parent = baseenv()) res <- daply(X, "ID", buildTimeSeriesFromDataFrame, env = e1) return(get("xx", e1)) } Time03 <- replicate(100, system.time(tsDaply(X, X$ID))[[1]]) median(Time03) hist(Time03) xtsDaply <- function(...) { e1 <- new.env(parent = baseenv()) res <- daply(X, "ID", buildXtsFromDataFrame, env = e1) return(get("xx", e1)) } Time04 <- replicate(100, system.time(xtsDaply(X, X$ID))[[1]]) median(Time04) hist(Time04) plot(density(Time04), col = "red", xlim = c( min(c(Time02, Time01, Time03, Time04)), max(c(Time02, Time01, Time03, Time04))), ylim = c(0,100)) lines(density(Time03), col = "blue") lines(density(Time02)) lines(density(Time01)) -----Original Message----- From: Daniele Amberti Sent: 11 March 2011 14:44 To: r-help@r-project.org Subject: dataframe to a timeseries object I’m wondering which is the most efficient (time, than memory usage) way to obtain a multivariate time series object from a data frame (the easiest data structure to get data from a database trough RODBC). I have a starting point using timeSeries or xts library (these libraries can handle time zones), below you can find code to test. Merging parallelization (cbind) is something I’m thinking at (suggestions from users with experience on this topic is highly appreciated), any suggestion is welcome. My platform is Windows XP, R 2.12.1, latest available packages on CRAN for timeSeries and xts. set.seed(123) N <- 9000 X <- data.frame( ID = c(rep(1,N), rep(2,N,), rep(3,N), rep(4,N)), DATE = rep(as.POSIXct("2000-01-01", tz = "GMT")+ 0:(N-1), 4), VALUE = runif(N*4)) library(timeSeries) buildTimeSeriesFromDataFrame <- function(x, env) { { if(exists("xx", envir = env)) assign("xx", cbind(get("xx", env), timeSeries(x$VALUE, x$DATE, format = '%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S', zone = 'GMT', units = as.character(x$ID[1]))), envir = env) else assign("xx", timeSeries(x$VALUE, x$DATE, format = '%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S', zone = 'GMT', units = as.character(x$ID[1])), envir = env) return(TRUE) } } fooBy <- function(...) { e1 <- new.env(parent = baseenv()) res <- by(X, X$ID, buildTimeSeriesFromDataFrame, env = e1, simplify = TRUE) return(get("xx", e1)) } Time01 <- replicate(100, system.time(fooBy(X, X$ID, buildTimeSeriesFromDataFrame, simplify = TRUE))[[1]]) median(Time01) hist(Time01) library(xts) buildXtsFromDataFrame <- function(x, env) { { if(exists("xx", envir = env)) assign("xx", cbind(get("xx", env), xts(x$VALUE, as.POSIXct(x$DATE, format = '%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S'), tzone = 'GMT')), envir = env) else assign("xx", xts(x$VALUE, as.POSIXct(x$DATE, format = '%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S'), tzone = 'GMT'), envir = env) return(TRUE) } } fooBy <- function(...) { e1 <- new.env(parent = baseenv()) res <- by(X, X$ID, buildXtsFromDataFrame, env = e1, simplify = TRUE) return(get("xx", e1)) } Time02 <- replicate(100, system.time(fooBy(X, X$ID, buildTimeSeriesFromDataFrame, simplify = TRUE))[[1]]) median(Time02) hist(Time02) plot(density(Time02), xlim = c(min(c(Time02, Time01)), max(c(Time02, Time01)))) lines(density(Time01)) Best regards, Daniele Amberti ORS Srl Via Agostino Morando 1/3 12060 Roddi (Cn) - Italy Tel. +39 0173 620211 Fax. +39 0173 620299 / +39 0173 433111 Web Site www.ors.it ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Qualsiasi utilizzo non autorizzato del presente messaggio e dei suoi allegati è vietato e potrebbe costituire reato. 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