Example aq_pp Commands

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Required Files

This tutorial requires 2 small files: exampledata.csv and lookup.csv, which can both be found in tutorials/etl-engine in the git repository.

Overview

aq_pp is the Essentia Preprocessor. It is very powerful and is used to modify input data for quick analysis or loading into the Essentia Database (Udb).

The command structure of aq_pp consists of an input specification specifying which file(s) to take the data from, various processing specifications to determine how data is processed, and output specifications describing how and where to put the results of your preprocessing. There are also a variety of global options that modify the environment and default variables used in aq_pp.

For a full list and description of the available options, see the aq_pp Documentation.

This tutorial will emphasize the most commonly used options for aq_pp and how to use them to provide a simple modification or analysis of the two input files, exampledata.csv and lookup.csv. These options are:

  • Input Specifications: -f, -d, -cat, -cmb, and -var.
  • Process Specifications: -eval, all -map options, -filt, -sub, and -grep.
  • Output Specifications: -o, -ovar, and -udb -imp.

We will end with using a small portion of these options in conditional option groups (if else statements).

Input Specifications

First let’s create a simple command that imports our example file exampledata.csv and defines its columns.

aq_pp -f,+1 exampledata.csv -d f:float_col X s,up:last_name s:first_name X

  • This command uses a -f statement to skip the header line of exampledata.csv and then reads in the rest of the data. It then says it will defined the data’s columns with the -d option.
  • It then imports the first column as a float, skips the second column (integer_col), imports last_name as a string and capitalize every letter in it, imports first_name as a string, and ignores the last column (country). The output is:
"float_col","last_name","first_name"
99.909999999999997,"LAWRENCE","Lois"
73.609999999999999,"HAMILTON","Evelyn"
45.289999999999999,"WHEELER","Sarah"
3.5299999999999998,"KELLEY","Jacqueline"

Now we want to combine the two example files by row using the -cat option.

aq_pp -f,+1 exampledata.csv -d f:float_col i:integer_col s:last_name s:first_name s:country -cat,+1 lookup.csv s:grade f:float_2 s:last_name s:first_name s:country

  • This tells aq_pp to skip the first line of exampledata.csv and import the rest of the data. Then it uses -cat,+1 to add all except for the first line of lookup.csv to the imported records.
  • The columns last_name, first_name, and country are in both files so they will have values for all eight resulting rows. However, float_col and integer_col only exist in exampledata.csv so only the first four records of the result will have values for these columns. Similarly, grade and float_2 only exist in lookup.csv so only the last four rows of the result will have values for these columns. The output is:
"float_col","integer_col","last_name","first_name","country","grade","float_2"
99.909999999999997,5350,"Lawrence","Lois","Philippines",,0
73.609999999999999,1249,"Hamilton","Evelyn","Portugal",,0
45.289999999999999,8356,"Wheeler","Sarah","Portugal",,0
3.5299999999999998,9678,"Kelley","Jacqueline","Philippines",,0
0,0,"Lawrence","Lois","Philippines","A",12.300000000000001
0,0,"Hamilton","Evelyn","Portugal","C",96.599999999999994
0,0,"Wheeler","Sarah","Portugal","F",89
0,0,"Kelley","Jacqueline","Philippines","F",57.600000000000001

As you can see this automatically gives values of zero or the empty string (“”) to rows from a dataset that is missing the full set of columns. However, what if we wanted just one set of rows with meaningful values in all of the columns?

With these example datasets, this actually makes more sense since both datasets contain some identical columns with identical values in those columns. Thus we want to combine these two datasets by column using the -cmb option.

aq_pp -f,+1 exampledata.csv -d f:float_col i:integer_col s:last_name s:first_name s:country -cmb,+1 lookup.csv s:grade f:float_2 s:last_name s:first_name s:country

  • This command tells aq_pp to skip the first line of exampledata.csv and import the rest of the data. It then combines all except for the first line of lookup.csv with the imported records by the datasets’ shared columns using -cmb,+1.
  • The columns last_name, first_name, and country are in both files so they are used to combine the datasets. The columns float_col, integer_col, grade, and float_2 are added to the resulting dataset by their unique values in the last_name, first_name, and country columns. The resulting data set will contain columns float_col, integer_col, last_name, first_name, country, grade, and float_2. The output is:
"float_col","integer_col","last_name","first_name","country","grade","float_2"
99.909999999999997,5350,"Lawrence","Lois","Philippines","A",12.300000000000001
73.609999999999999,1249,"Hamilton","Evelyn","Portugal","C",96.599999999999994
45.289999999999999,8356,"Wheeler","Sarah","Portugal","F",89
3.5299999999999998,9678,"Kelley","Jacqueline","Philippines","F",57.600000000000001

This added on the extra two columns from lookup.csv onto the corresponding columns from exampledata.csv. The -cmb option also includes the capability to overwrite existing columns in the input dataset with values from columns with the same name in the combined dataset.

We can adjust are command to utilize this feature by simply changing the specification of the combined dataset’s columns to match those of the input dataset.

aq_pp -f,+1 exampledata.csv -d s:float_col f:integer_col s:last_name s:first_name s:country -cmb,+1 lookup.csv s,cmb:float_col f,cmb:integer_col s,key:last_name s,key:first_name s,key:country

  • This command tells aq_pp to skip the first line of exampledata.csv and import the rest of the data just as before. It also still combines all except for the first line of lookup.csv with the imported records by the datasets’ shared columns. However, the first two columns in the combine statement are given the attribute ‘cmb’.
  • This attribute tells aq_pp to replace any existing values of the attributed columns with the values in the combining file. In this case, the first two columns in exampledata.csv are replaced by the first two columns in lookup.csv. The output is:
"float_col","integer_col","last_name","first_name","country"
"A",12.300000000000001,"Lawrence","Lois","Philippines"
"C",96.599999999999994,"Hamilton","Evelyn","Portugal"
"F",89,"Wheeler","Sarah","Portugal"
"F",57.600000000000001,"Kelley","Jacqueline","Philippines"

Process Specifications

Now that we know how to input datasets and combine multiple datasets together, lets focus on how to go about processing datasets. A very useful feature of aq_pp is the ability to define, store, and modify variables.

The creation of variables is accomplished using the -var option and their modification is typically handled using the ever-useful -eval option with the variable as its argument or its input.

aq_pp -f,+1 exampledata.csv -d f:float_col i:integer_col s:last_name s:first_name s:country -var ‘f:rolling_sum’ 0 -var ‘f:record_count’ 0 -eval ‘rolling_sum’ ‘rolling_sum + float_col’ -eval ‘record_count’ ‘record_count + 1’ -eval ‘f:rolling_average’ ‘rolling_sum / record_count’

  • This initializes two new variables: a float called rolling_sum set to zero and a float called record_count set to zero. It then adds the value of float_col to rolling_sum, increases record_count by one, and divides rolling_sum by record_count for each record in the input data.
  • The variables are not included in the standard output, only the columns are included. The output is:
"float_col","integer_col","last_name","first_name","country","rolling_average"
99.909999999999997,5350,"Lawrence","Lois","Philippines",99.909999999999997
73.609999999999999,1249,"Hamilton","Evelyn","Portugal",86.759999999999991
45.289999999999999,8356,"Wheeler","Sarah","Portugal",72.936666666666653
3.5299999999999998,9678,"Kelley","Jacqueline","Philippines",55.584999999999994

While defining variables is incredibly useful, -eval also has the capability to create entirely new columns or modify existing ones. The only change necessary to act on columns is to give -eval a column name or column specification as its argument.

The difference between a column name and a column specification is that a column name is the name of an existing column whereas a column specification is the type you want the new column to be followed by a : and the name of the new column.

aq_pp -f,+1 exampledata.csv -d f:float_col i:integer_col s:last_name s:first_name s:country -eval last_name ‘first_name + ” ” + last_name’ -eval integer_col ‘float_col * integer_col’ -eval s:mixed_col ‘country + ” : ” + ToS(integer_col)’ -c last_name mixed_col

  • This command adds the value of first_name and last_name separated by a space and saves this combined string into last_name, overriding the existing value for that record in that column. It then multiplies the float_col by the integer_col and saves this product into integer_col, overriding the existing value.
  • Finally, it creates a new column called mixed_col that contains the value of country followed by ‘ : ‘ and the string-converted value of the modified integer_col. It then limits the columns that are output to just the last_name and mixed_col columns (see the -o option further on in this documentation). The output is:
"last_name","mixed_col"
"Lois Lawrence","Philippines : 534518"
"Evelyn Hamilton","Portugal : 91938"
"Sarah Wheeler","Portugal : 378443"
"Jacqueline Kelley","Philippines : 34163"

As you can see, the -eval option is incredibly useful since it allows you to create or modify columns based on the results of an expression. This expression can reference literal values (such as 1 or “a string”), existing columns or variables, or any of the default variables that are built into aq_pp.

One such default variable is $RowNum which simply keeps track of which record you are streaming from your input data file. This can be a useful value to add on to your exported data if you might need to reference your input data later in your analysis.

aq_pp -f,+1 exampledata.csv -d f:float_col i:integer_col s:last_name s:first_name s:country -eval i:actual_row_number ‘$RowNum + 1’

  • This creates a new integer column called actual_row_number that adds 1 to the value of $RowNum for each record of the file. This corrects for the fact that we skipped the header line and thus represents the actual row number from exampledata.csv. The output is:
"float_col","integer_col","last_name","first_name","country","actual_row_number"
99.909999999999997,5350,"Lawrence","Lois","Philippines",2
73.609999999999999,1249,"Hamilton","Evelyn","Portugal",3
45.289999999999999,8356,"Wheeler","Sarah","Portugal",4
3.5299999999999998,9678,"Kelley","Jacqueline","Philippines",5

The expression in -eval can use much more than existing columns and previously defined variables. There are also a variety of built-in functions that can only be used in the -eval option that allow much more sophisticated analysis of your data.

See the aq_pp Documentation for a full list and example of these functions. For now I’ll introduce the simpler functions that allow you to find the minumum, maximum, and hash value of various columns.

aq_pp -f,+1 exampledata.csv -d f:float_col i:integer_col s:last_name s:first_name s:country -eval i:minimum ‘Min(float_col, integer_col)’ -eval i:maximum ‘Max(float_col, integer_col)’ -eval i:hash ‘SHash(country)’ -c minimum maximum hash

  • This stores the minimum and maximum values of float_col and integer_col into columns minimum and maximum, respectively. It then calculates the integer hash value of country and stores it in a column called hash.
  • The output columns are then limited to minimum, maximum, and hash. The output is:
"minimum","maximum","hash"
99,5350,4213117258
73,1249,1264705971
45,8356,1264705971
3,9678,4213117258

While the -eval option is useful when modifying your existing data or creating new data off of it, it does not easily allow you to limit which data continues on to the rest of your analysis.

This is where the -filt option comes in handy. -filt makes it easy to limit your data based on their values or ranges in values of various columns.

aq_pp -f,+1 exampledata.csv -d f:float_col i:integer_col s:last_name s:first_name s:country -filt ‘(country == “Portugal”) && (integer_col >= 4000)’

  • This command filters the data so that only records where the country column has a value of “Portugal” and the integer_col column is at least 4000 will continue to be analyzed. In this case, only one record passes the filter. The output is:
"float_col","integer_col","last_name","first_name","country"
45.289999999999999,8356,"Wheeler","Sarah","Portugal"

-eval is incredibly powerful when acting on numerical columns and many of its functions can be useful in processing string columns, but a lot of analysis needs more advanced parsing and combination of string type columns than -eval can provide.

Thus aq_pp contains a variety of mapping functions to allow values from certain columns to be extracted and recombined into the same or different columns. The first two sets of mapping functions are –mapf and -mapc, and -mapf,rx and -mapc.

The diffference between these two sets of mapping functions is that the first one uses RT mapping syntax and matches the entire string everytime, whereas the second uses Regular Expression Syntax and can match either the entire string or subsets of the string.

aq_pp -f,+1 exampledata.csv -d X X s:last_name s:first_name X -mapf last_name ‘%%last%%’ -mapf first_name ‘%%first%%’ -mapc s:full_name ‘%%first%% %%last%%’

  • This uses -mapf to extract the last name from the last_name column and store it temporarily as the variable %%last%%. It then extracts the first name from the first_name column and stores it temporarily as the variable %%first%%.
  • Finally, it uses -mapc to define a new string column called full_name and put the values of first_name and last_name into it, separated by a space.

aq_pp -f,+1 exampledata.csv -d X X s:last_name s:first_name X -mapf,rx last_name ‘.*’ -mapf,rx first_name ‘.*’ -mapc s:full_name ‘%%1%% %%0%%’

  • This command instead uses -mapf,rx to match and extract the last name from the last_name column and store it temporarily as the implicit variable %%0%%. It then matches and extracts the first name from the first_name column and stores it temporarily as the implicit variable %%1%%.
  • Finally, it again uses -mapc to define a new string column called full_name that contains the values of first_name and last_name, separated by a space.

Both of these commands extract data from last_name and first_name and then put the values that were in these columns into a new column containing the full name. Note; however, that the RegEx based “-mapf,rx” does not have named placeholders for the extracted data; The placeholders are implicit:

  • %%0%% – References the entire match in the first “-mapf,rx”; i.e. the entire value in the last_name column.
  • %%1%% – References the entire match in the second “-mapf,rx”; the entire value in the first_name column.

The output of both of these commands is:

"last_name","first_name","full_name"
"Lawrence","Lois","Lois Lawrence"
"Hamilton","Evelyn","Evelyn Hamilton"
"Wheeler","Sarah","Sarah Wheeler"
"Kelley","Jacqueline","Jacqueline Kelley"

The first two sets of mapping functions allow you to take data from various columns and put them into other columns, however this isnt always necessary. Sometimes, all you want to do is modify an existing column.

This is where you use the second two sets of mapping functions, -map and map,rx. Again, the difference between these two functions are that the former uses RT syntax and the latter uses Regular Expression Syntax.

aq_pp -f,+1 exampledata.csv -d X X X s:first_name X -map first_name ‘%%first_initial:@nab:1-1%%%*’ ‘%%first_initial%%.’

  • This takes the values in first_name and maps them to the first initial followed by a ”.”, using the RT mapping function -map. The output is:
"first_name"
"L."
"E."
"S."
"J."

aq_pp -f,+1 exampledata.csv -d X X X s:first_name X -map,rx first_name ‘^\(.\).*$’ ‘%%1%%.’

This command takes the values in first_name and maps them to the first initial followed by a ”.”, using the RegEx mapping function -map,rx. The output is:

"first_name"
"L."
"E."
"S."
"J."

Mapping allows you to utilize and modify string type columns that are already in your dataset. But what if you want to replace values of one of the columns in your dataset with values from another dataset?

This is where you would use -sub. By simply specifying which file contains the values you want to compare your data to and which values you want to replace your data with, you can easily overwrite an existing column with new values.

aq_pp -f,+1 exampledata.csv -d f:float_col i:integer_col s:last_name s:first_name s:country -sub last_name lookup.csv TO X FROM X X

  • This checks whether any values in last_name match any of the values in the third column of lookup.csv and, if they do, replaces those values with the value in the first column of lookup.csv. The output is:
"float_col","integer_col","last_name","first_name","country"
99.909999999999997,5350,"A","Lois","Philippines"
73.609999999999999,1249,"C","Evelyn","Portugal"
45.289999999999999,8356,"F","Sarah","Portugal"
3.5299999999999998,9678,"F","Jacqueline","Philippines"

A similar task is to do the first half of the -sub option. That is, comparing values of one of the column in your dataset to those of a column in a different dataset.

You can accomplish this with the -grep option, which only requires the file that contains your lookup values and which column in the file contains these lookup values.

aq_pp -f,+1 exampledata.csv -d f:float_col i:integer_col s:last_name s:first_name s:country -grep last_name lookup.csv X X FROM X X

  • This command filters the data to include only values in last_name that match any of the values in the third column of lookup.csv. In this case all of the records pass since the last_names are the same in both exampledata.csv and lookup.csv. The output is:
"float_col","integer_col","last_name","first_name","country"
99.909999999999997,5350,"Lawrence","Lois","Philippines"
73.609999999999999,1249,"Hamilton","Evelyn","Portugal"
45.289999999999999,8356,"Wheeler","Sarah","Portugal"
3.5299999999999998,9678,"Kelley","Jacqueline","Philippines"

Output Specifications

Now that you’ve completed your preprocessing of the data, its time to output your results. The output goes to standard output by default.

aq_pp -f,+1 exampledata.csv -d f:float_col i:integer_col s:last_name s:first_name s:country -o –

  • This outputs the tutorial data to standard out.

aq_pp -f,+1 exampledata.csv -d f:float_col i:integer_col s:last_name s:first_name s:country

  • This command does the same thing since aq_pp’s default output spec is to standard out (‘-o -‘). The output is:
"float_col","integer_col","last_name","first_name","country"
99.909999999999997,5350,"Lawrence","Lois","Philippines"
73.609999999999999,1249,"Hamilton","Evelyn","Portugal"
45.289999999999999,8356,"Wheeler","Sarah","Portugal"
3.5299999999999998,9678,"Kelley","Jacqueline","Philippines"

You can also specify that you want the output to be saved to a file, which columns you want output, and whether you want the output to have a header.

aq_pp -f,+1 exampledata.csv -d f:float_col i:integer_col s:last_name s:first_name s:country -o,notitle outputfile.csv -c first_name last_name

  • This saves first_name and then last_name of exampledata.csv without a header to a file called outputfile.csv. The output the file contains is:
"Lois","Lawrence"
"Evelyn","Hamilton"
"Sarah","Wheeler"
"Jacqueline","Kelley"

Another form of output is to only output the variables you’ve defined and modified in your previous analysis. This is accomplished with the -ovar option.

aq_pp -f,+1 exampledata.csv -d f:float_col i:integer_col s:last_name s:first_name s:country -var ‘f:rolling_sum’ 0 -var ‘f:record_count’ 0 -eval ‘rolling_sum’ ‘rolling_sum + float_col’ -eval ‘record_count’ ‘record_count + 1’ -eval ‘f:rolling_average’ ‘rolling_sum / record_count’ -ovar –

  • This command initializes two new variables: a float called rolling_sum set to zero and a float called record_count set to zero. It then adds the value of float_col to rolling_sum, increases record_count by one, and divides rolling_sum by record_count for each record in the input data.
  • The columns are not included in the standard output, only the variables are included. The output is:
"rolling_sum","record_count"
222.33999999999997,4

If you just want to preprocess your data then you can pretty much stop there. But, if you want to continue to analyze your data and utilize the true power of Essentia then you should import your data into the Essentia Database (Udb).

The Udb database allows you to store your preprocessed and modified data in tables and vectors, organized by the unique values of a primary key (pkey) column. It then allows you to apply attributes to the data as it is imported into these tables and vectors, when more than one record contains the unique value of the key column.

Thus you can condense your data to just the number of unique values of the specified column, with all of the relevant records for each unique value of that column combined by the attributes you specify.

Say you have a database called my_database that contains a vector called country_grouping which has the column specification s,pkey:country s:full_name i,+add:integer_col f,+max:float_col s:extra_column. Running the following code will import the data into your vector and apply the attributes listed there.

aq_pp -f,+1 exampledata.csv -d f:float_col i:integer_col s:last_name s:first_name s:country -eval s:full_name ‘first_name + ” ” + last_name’ -ddef -udb -imp my_database:country_grouping

  • The output from exporting the vector to standard out (see aq_udb documentation) is:
"country","full_name","integer_col","float_col","extra_column"
"Portugal","Sarah Wheeler",9605,73.609999999999999,
"Philippines","Jacqueline Kelley",15028,99.909999999999997,

To learn more about the Essentia Database, please review our aq_udb Tutorial.

Conditional Option Groups

A final yet incredibly useful technique for processing your data is to use conditional statements to modify your data based on the results of the conditions. In aq_pp these are contained in -if, -elif, and else statements.

aq_pp -f,+1 exampledata.csv -d f:float_col i:integer_col s:last_name s:first_name s:country -if -filt ‘country == “Portugal”‘ -eval s:Is_Portugese ‘”TRUE”‘ -else -eval Is_Portugese ‘”FALSE”‘ -endif

  • This creates an -if -else statement that creates the column Is_Portugese and gives it a value of TRUE if the country is ‘Portugal’ and FALSE otherwise. The output is:
"float_col","integer_col","last_name","first_name","country","Is_Portugese"
99.909999999999997,5350,"Lawrence","Lois","Philippines","FALSE"
73.609999999999999,1249,"Hamilton","Evelyn","Portugal","TRUE"
45.289999999999999,8356,"Wheeler","Sarah","Portugal","TRUE"
3.5299999999999998,9678,"Kelley","Jacqueline","Philippines","FALSE"

aq_pp -f,+1 exampledata.csv -d f:float_col i:integer_col s:last_name s:first_name s:country -filt ‘(float_col > 0) && (float_col <=100)’ -if -filt ‘(float_col > 0) && (float_col <= 25)’ -eval s:quartile ‘”FIRST”‘ -elif -filt ‘(float_col > 25) && (float_col <= 50)’ -eval quartile ‘”SECOND”‘ -elif -filt ‘(float_col > 50) && (float_col <= 75)’ -eval quartile ‘”THIRD”‘ -else -eval quartile ‘”FOURTH”‘ -endif

  • This command filters to make sure only records that have a value in float_col between 0 and 100 continue to be processed. It then creates an -if -elif -else statement that creates the column quartile and gives it the value of FIRST if float column is between 0 and 25, SECOND if float_col is between 25 and 50, THIRD if float_col is between 50 and 75, and FOURTH otherwise. The output is:
"float_col","integer_col","last_name","first_name","country","quartile" 99.909999999999997,5350,"Lawrence","Lois","Philippines","FOURTH" 73.609999999999999,1249,"Hamilton","Evelyn","Portugal","THIRD" 45.289999999999999,8356,"Wheeler","Sarah","Portugal","SECOND" 3.5299999999999998,9678,"Kelley","Jacqueline","Philippines","FIRST"

These conditional statements can be used to set values for only certain subsets of your data or set different values for different subsets of your data and are very powerful.

You should now have a better understanding of the main options used in the aq_pp command and how aq_pp commands should be structured. It is highly recommended that you now review our aq_udb tutorial to learn how to utilize the incredible scability of the Essentia Database.

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