Htykuut

I'm working with "airplane" data set from this reference http://square.github.io/crossfilter/

date,delay,distance,origin,destination

01010001,14,405,MCI,MDW

01010530,-11,370,LAX,PHX

...



  // Create the crossfilter for the relevant dimensions and groups.

  var flight = crossfilter(flights),

      all = flight.groupAll(),

      date = flight.dimension(function(d) { return d.date; }),

      dates = date.group(d3.time.day),

      hour = flight.dimension(function(d) { return d.date.getHours() + d.date.getMinutes() / 60; }),

      hours = hour.group(Math.floor),

      delay = flight.dimension(function(d) { return Math.max(-60, Math.min(149, d.delay)); }),

      delays = delay.group(function(d) { return Math.floor(d / 10) * 10; }),

      distance = flight.dimension(function(d) { return Math.min(1999, d.distance); }),

      distances = distance.group(function(d) { return Math.floor(d / 50) * 50; });

Following document of Crossfilter, "groups don't observe the filters on their own dimension" => we can get filtered records from groups that theirs dimension are not filtered at this moment, can't we?

I have performed some test but this is not correct:

  console.dir(date.group().all()); // 50895 records

  console.dir(distance.group().all()); // 297 records



  date.filter([new Date(2001, 1, 1), new Date(2001, 2, 1)]);



  console.dir(date.group().all()); // 50895 records => this number still the same because we are filtering on its dimension

  console.dir(distance.group().all()); // 297 records => but this number still the same too. I don't know why

1. Could you please explain for me why number of "distance.group().all()" still the same as before we perform the filter? Am I missing something here?




2. If we really cannot get "filtered records" from "distance dimension" by this way, how can I achive this?

Thanks.

So, yes, this is the expected behavior.

Crossfilter will create a "bin" in the group for every value it finds by applying the dimension key and group key functions. Then when a filter is applied, it will apply the reduce-remove function, which by default subtracts the count of rows removed.

The result is that empty bins still exist, but they have a value of 0.

I should add this to the Crossfilter Gotchas page, since it's something everyone runs into when they start using the library. (I don't remember the rationale at the moment, but I think at one point I determined this is the only consistent way that crossfilter could be implemented.)

If you want to remove the zeros, you can use a "fake group" to do that.

function remove_empty_bins(source_group) {

    return {

        all:function () {

            return source_group.all().filter(function(d) {

                //return Math.abs(d.value) > 0.00001; // if using floating-point numbers

                return d.value !== 0; // if integers only

            });

        }

    };

}

https://github.com/dc-js/dc.js/wiki/FAQ#remove-empty-bins

This function wraps the group in an object which implements .all() by calling source_group.all() and then filters the result. So if you're using dc.js you could supply this fake group to your chart like so:

chart.group(remove_empty_bins(yourGroup));