Custom R Component – Add Date Attributes
This component enriches calendar dates with additional context, ie working days and non working days are identified. Such variables can help to enhance time-series forecasts in SAP Predictive Analytics, Automated Analytics mode.
Depending on your use case, there might be many further date-related variables that could help improve a time-series forecast.
Disclaimer
Please note that this component is not an official release by SAP and that it is provided as-is without any guarantee or support. Please test the component to ensure it works for your purposes.
Prerequisites
- R libraries lubridate, Hmisc and timeDate must be installed.
- One column of type Text must contain the date.
Limitations
The component is not optimised for performance. For datasets in which the same date occurs multiple times you may want to restrict the data to unique dates first, add the date attributes and join these to the whole dataset.
Usage
These parameters can be set by the user:
| Parameter | Description |
|---|---|
| Date | Column that contains the date in textual format. |
| Date Format |
Specifies the string column’s date format in R notation. For instance: %d.%m.%Y See the documentation of the as.Date() function for the syntax. |
| Holiday Reference |
Specifies the region for identifying working days. Possible values are “London”, “New York Stock Exchange”, “Toronto Stock Exchange” and “Zurich”. |
Output column added by this component:
| Column | Description |
|---|---|
| SundayMonthInd |
Indicates if the date is a Sunday with the weekday’s occurrence count in the month so far. 0 otherwise. |
| MondayMonthInd | Indicates if the date is a Monday with the weekday’s occurrence count in the month so far. 0 otherwise. |
| TuesdayMonthInd | Indicates if the date is a Tuesday with the weekday’s occurrence count in the month so far. 0 otherwise. |
| WednesdayMonthInd | Indicates if the date is a Wednesday with the weekday’s occurrence count in the month so far. 0 otherwise. |
| ThursdayMonthInd | Indicates if the date is a Thursday with the weekday’s occurrence count in the month so far. 0 otherwise. |
| FridayMonthInd | Indicates if the date is a Friday with the weekday’s occurrence count in the month so far. 0 otherwise. |
| SaturdayMonthInd | Indicates if the date is a Saturday with the weekday’s occurrence count in the month so far. 0 otherwise. |
| LastSunday | 1 if last Sunday of the month. 0 otherwise. |
| LastMonday | 1 if last Monday of the month. 0 otherwise. |
| LastTuesday | 1 if last Tuesday of the month. 0 otherwise. |
| LastWednesday | 1 if last Wednesday of the month. 0 otherwise. |
| LastThursday | 1 if last Thursday of the month. 0 otherwise. |
| LastFriday | 1 if last Friday of the month. 0 otherwise. |
| LastSaturday | 1 if last Saturday of the month. 0 otherwise. |
| PenultimateSunday | 1 if penultimate Sunday of the month. 0 otherwise. |
| PenultimateMonday | 1 if penultimate Monday of the month. 0 otherwise. |
| PenultimateTuesday | 1 if penultimate Tuesday of the month. 0 otherwise. |
| PenultimateWednesday | 1 if penultimate Wednesday of the month. 0 otherwise. |
| PenultimateThursday | 1 if penultimate Thursday of the month. 0 otherwise. |
| PenultimateFriday | 1 if penultimate Friday of the month. 0 otherwise. |
| PenultimateSaturday | 1 if penultimate Saturday of the month. 0 otherwise. |
| Workingday | 1 if working day (Saturday, Sunday, Bank Holiday). 0 otherwise. |
| BeforeHoliday | 1 if before holiday. 0 otherwise. |
| Holiday | 1 if holiday (Saturday, Sunday, Bank Holiday). 0 otherwise. |
| ContributionToWorkingMonth | If working day: 1 divided by number of month’s working days. 0 otherwise. |
| ContributionToMonth | 1 divided by number of month’s days. |
| MonthWorkingDayInd | Indicates if working day with the work day’s occurrence count in the month so far. 0 otherwise. |
| ReverseMonthWorkingDayInd | Indicates if working day by counting down the work day’s occurrence count in the month. 0 otherwise. |
| Last5WDinMonthInd | Indicates the month’s last 5 working days by counting them up from 1 to 5. 0 otherwise. |
| Last5WDinMonth | 1 if one the month’s last 5 working days. 0 otherwise. |
| Last4WDinMonthInd | Indicates the month’s last 4 working days by counting them up from 1 to 4. 0 otherwise. |
| Last4WDinMonth | 1 if one the month’s last 5 working days. 0 otherwise. |
How to Implement
The component can be downloaded as .spar file from GitHub. Then deploy it as described here. You just need to import it through the option “Import/Model Component”, which you will find by clicking on the plus-sign at the bottom of the list of the available algorithms.
Example
This component was used to create some of the variables in the tutorial that forecasts the daily demand of the London bicycle hire scheme.
Hi Andreas,
Thanks for the useful blog. I am trying to run the following in SAP Predictive Analytics (Version: 3.3.2) with your R component. However I am running into the error message "REngine initialization failed".
I have already setup the R environment (R-3.4.0).
Any suggestions on how to fix this ?
Error screenshot:
Regards
Uday
Hello Uday,
It looks like the R configuration in your Expert Mode is incorrect.
I am not supporting these extensions anymore, but I will send you something offline.
Many Greetings
Andreas