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Fill time gaps and imputing missing values

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Important

Azure SQL Edge no longer supports the ARM64 platform.

When dealing with time series data, it's often possible that the time series data has missing values for the attributes. It's also possible that, because of the nature of the data, or because of interruptions in data collection, there are time gaps in the dataset.

For example, when collecting energy usage statistics for a smart device, whenever the device isn't operational there are gaps in the usage statistics. Similarly, in a machine telemetry data collection scenario, it's possible that the different sensors are configured to emit data at different frequencies, resulting in missing values for the sensors. For example, if there are two sensors, voltage and pressure, configured at 100 Hz and 10-Hz frequency respectively, the voltage sensor emits data every one-hundredth of a second, while the pressure sensor only emits data every one-tenth of a second.

The following table describes a machine telemetry dataset, which was collected at a one-second interval.

timestamp               VoltageReading  PressureReading
----------------------- --------------- ----------------
2020-09-07 06:14:41.000 164.990400      97.223600
2020-09-07 06:14:42.000 162.241300      93.992800
2020-09-07 06:14:43.000 163.271200      NULL
2020-09-07 06:14:44.000 161.368100      93.403700
2020-09-07 06:14:45.000 NULL            NULL
2020-09-07 06:14:46.000 NULL            98.364800
2020-09-07 06:14:49.000 NULL            94.098300
2020-09-07 06:14:51.000 157.695700      103.359100
2020-09-07 06:14:52.000 157.019200      NULL
2020-09-07 06:14:54.000 NULL            95.352000
2020-09-07 06:14:56.000 159.183500      100.748200

There are two important characteristics of the preceding dataset.

  • The dataset doesn't contain any data points related to several timestamps 2020-09-07 06:14:47.000, 2020-09-07 06:14:48.000, 2020-09-07 06:14:50.000, 2020-09-07 06:14:53.000, and 2020-09-07 06:14:55.000. These timestamps are gaps in the dataset.
  • There are missing values, represented as null, for the Voltage and pressure readings.

Gap filling

Gap filling is a technique that helps create contiguous, ordered set of timestamps to ease the analysis of time series data. In Azure SQL Edge, the easiest way to fill gaps in the time series dataset is to define a temporary table with the desired time distribution and then do a LEFT OUTER JOIN or a RIGHT OUTER JOIN operation on the dataset table.

Taking the MachineTelemetry data represented previously as an example, the following query can be used to generate contiguous, ordered set of timestamps for analysis.

Note

The following query generates the missing rows, with the timestamp values and null values for the attributes.

CREATE TABLE #SeriesGenerate (dt DATETIME PRIMARY KEY CLUSTERED)
GO

DECLARE @startdate DATETIME = '2020-09-07 06:14:41.000',
    @endtime DATETIME = '2020-09-07 06:14:56.000'

WHILE (@startdate <= @endtime)
BEGIN
    INSERT INTO #SeriesGenerate
    VALUES (@startdate)

    SET @startdate = DATEADD(SECOND, 1, @startdate)
END

SELECT a.dt AS TIMESTAMP,
    b.VoltageReading,
    b.PressureReading
FROM #SeriesGenerate a
LEFT JOIN MachineTelemetry b
    ON a.dt = b.[timestamp];

The above query produces the following output containing all one-second timestamps in the specified range.

Here's the result set:

timestamp               VoltageReading    PressureReading
----------------------- ----------------- ----------------
2020-09-07 06:14:41.000 164.990400        97.223600
2020-09-07 06:14:42.000 162.241300        93.992800
2020-09-07 06:14:43.000 163.271200        NULL
2020-09-07 06:14:44.000 161.368100        93.403700
2020-09-07 06:14:45.000 NULL              NULL
2020-09-07 06:14:46.000 NULL              98.364800
2020-09-07 06:14:47.000 NULL              NULL
2020-09-07 06:14:48.000 NULL              NULL
2020-09-07 06:14:49.000 NULL              94.098300
2020-09-07 06:14:50.000 NULL              NULL
2020-09-07 06:14:51.000 157.695700        103.359100
2020-09-07 06:14:52.000 157.019200        NULL
2020-09-07 06:14:53.000 NULL              NULL
2020-09-07 06:14:54.000 NULL              95.352000
2020-09-07 06:14:55.000 NULL              NULL
2020-09-07 06:14:56.000 159.183500        100.748200

Impute missing values

The preceding query generated the missing timestamps for data analysis, however it didn't replace any of the missing values (represented as null) for voltage and pressure readings. In Azure SQL Edge, a new syntax was added to the T-SQL LAST_VALUE() and FIRST_VALUE() functions, which provide mechanisms to impute missing values, based on the preceding or following values in the dataset.

The new syntax adds IGNORE NULLS and RESPECT NULLS clause to the LAST_VALUE() and FIRST_VALUE() functions. A following query on the MachineTelemetry dataset computes the missing values using the LAST_VALUE function, where missing values are replaced with the last observed value in the dataset.

SELECT timestamp,
    VoltageReading AS OriginalVoltageValues,
    LAST_VALUE(VoltageReading) IGNORE NULLS OVER (
        ORDER BY timestamp
        ) AS ImputedUsingLastValue,
    PressureReading AS OriginalPressureValues,
    LAST_VALUE(PressureReading) IGNORE NULLS OVER (
        ORDER BY timestamp
        ) AS ImputedUsingLastValue
FROM MachineTelemetry
ORDER BY timestamp;

Here's the result set:

timestamp               OrigVoltageVals  ImputedVoltage OrigPressureVals  ImputedPressure
----------------------- ---------------- -------------- ----------------- ----------------
2020-09-07 06:14:41.000 164.990400       164.990400     97.223600         97.223600
2020-09-07 06:14:42.000 162.241300       162.241300     93.992800         93.992800
2020-09-07 06:14:43.000 163.271200       163.271200     NULL              93.992800
2020-09-07 06:14:44.000 161.368100       161.368100     93.403700         93.403700
2020-09-07 06:14:45.000 NULL             161.368100     NULL              93.403700
2020-09-07 06:14:46.000 NULL             161.368100     98.364800         98.364800
2020-09-07 06:14:49.000 NULL             161.368100     94.098300         94.098300
2020-09-07 06:14:51.000 157.695700       157.695700     103.359100        103.359100
2020-09-07 06:14:52.000 157.019200       157.019200     NULL              103.359100
2020-09-07 06:14:54.000 NULL             157.019200     95.352000         95.352000
2020-09-07 06:14:56.000 159.183500       159.183500     100.748200        100.748200

The following query imputes the missing values using both the LAST_VALUE() and the FIRST_VALUE function. For the output column ImputedVoltage, the last observed value replaces the missing values, while for the output column ImputedPressure the missing values are replaced by the next observed value in the dataset.

SELECT dt AS [timestamp],
    VoltageReading AS OrigVoltageVals,
    LAST_VALUE(VoltageReading) IGNORE NULLS OVER (
        ORDER BY dt
        ) AS ImputedVoltage,
    PressureReading AS OrigPressureVals,
    FIRST_VALUE(PressureReading) IGNORE NULLS OVER (
        ORDER BY dt ROWS BETWEEN CURRENT ROW
                AND UNBOUNDED FOLLOWING
        ) AS ImputedPressure
FROM (
    SELECT a.dt,
        b.VoltageReading,
        b.PressureReading
    FROM #SeriesGenerate a
    LEFT JOIN MachineTelemetry b
        ON a.dt = b.[timestamp]
    ) A
ORDER BY timestamp;

Here's the result set:

timestamp               OrigVoltageVals  ImputedVoltage  OrigPressureVals  ImputedPressure
----------------------- ---------------- --------------- ----------------- ---------------
2020-09-07 06:14:41.000 164.990400       164.990400      97.223600         97.223600
2020-09-07 06:14:42.000 162.241300       162.241300      93.992800         93.992800
2020-09-07 06:14:43.000 163.271200       163.271200      NULL              93.403700
2020-09-07 06:14:44.000 161.368100       161.368100      93.403700         93.403700
2020-09-07 06:14:45.000 NULL             161.368100      NULL              98.364800
2020-09-07 06:14:46.000 NULL             161.368100      98.364800         98.364800
2020-09-07 06:14:47.000 NULL             161.368100      NULL              94.098300
2020-09-07 06:14:48.000 NULL             161.368100      NULL              94.098300
2020-09-07 06:14:49.000 NULL             161.368100      94.098300         94.098300
2020-09-07 06:14:50.000 NULL             161.368100      NULL              103.359100
2020-09-07 06:14:51.000 157.695700       157.695700      103.359100        103.359100
2020-09-07 06:14:52.000 157.019200       157.019200      NULL              95.352000
2020-09-07 06:14:53.000 NULL             157.019200      NULL              95.352000
2020-09-07 06:14:54.000 NULL             157.019200      95.352000         95.352000
2020-09-07 06:14:55.000 NULL             157.019200      NULL              100.748200
2020-09-07 06:14:56.000 159.183500       159.183500      100.748200        100.748200

Note

The above query uses the FIRST_VALUE() function to replace missing values with the next observed value. The same result can be achieved by using the LAST_VALUE() function with a ORDER BY <ordering_column> DESC clause.

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