A Unified Data Analytics Framework for Time-Series Data

In the automotive industry today, vehicle data is collected and archived from a large, diverse group of vehicles and test cells for a variety of purposes. This data is usually time-series data with varying sampling rates. Often the teams collecting this data utilize different acquisition methods and file formats and have different reporting requirements. Furthermore, the data identifiers, units, and the sampling rates themselves are often subject to change. For this reason, a need for a unified data analytics platform that provides a common foundation that satisfies the requirements of multiple departments was identified. Dashboard2 is an in-house tool that provides a strict separation between the foundational code that processes the input data and the analysis code that generates interactive reports within MATLAB^®. It also provides interfaces to remote data sources and quick query capabilities that allow engineers to access specific data sets of interest in a generic and efficient manner. MATLAB and Simulink^® products such as Parallel Computing Toolbox™, MATLAB Compiler™, Database Toolbox™, Vehicle Network Toolbox™, as well as MATLAB tables, timetables, and built-in interfaces to Java, were instrumental in the development of Dashboard2. The same platform is designed to support interactive and automated data analysis on both Linux^® and Windows^®. Being able to frequently distribute updates and deliver a compiled, distributable solution allows engineers to work more efficiently and focus on data analysis function development rather than file processing code, with the assurance that there will be no need to rewrite the analysis function even if the data acquisition sources, signal units, or file formats change.