Kibana: Allow users to configure fitting/filling function for missing/null buckets

[timroes]

Kibana currently handles null within a chart a bit differently depending on the chart.

Since the way a null value should be handled really depends on the semantics of the data, we cannot make a meaningful decision for the user. We should rather give the user the possibility to change a "fitting function", that will calculate what values should be "fitted" in for null values. Possible values could be (the examples, show what that fitting function would turn the input series [2, null, null, 8] into):

Name | Description | Examples |
--------|------------------|---------------
None | Don't draw that value on the graph | [2, null null, 8]
Carry | Use the last non null value before that | [2, 2, 2, 8]
Nearest | Use the closest value (either before or after) that was non null | [2, 2, 8, 8]
Lookahead | Use the next non null value after that (opposite of Carry) | [2, 8, 8, 8]
Average | Use the average of the last and next non null value | [2, 5, 5, 8]
Linear | Linear interpolate between closest values | [2, 4, 6, 8]
Zero | Replace values with 0 | [2, 0, 0, 8]
Explicit | Specify an explicit value (x), that should be used instead | [2, x, x, 8]

This fitting settings would behave similar to the timelion .fit function, but should work for all charts.

[emilmirzayev]

When having those options, can it also make sense allowing the 4th option Custom value which replaces the nullvalue with the given? I am not sure how complex it is though

[timroes]

Hey, sorry I actually hit Send before I finished typing :D So I was still editing that issue, and yeah that's on the list too.

[emilmirzayev]

Suggesting to replace Scale with LinScale as it may be confusing keeping in mind that there are two most used scale types: linear and log

[timroes]

Thanks for that feedback. I changed the name in the above description.

[markov00]

Hey @timroes can you describe better what is the difference between the carry and the nearest functions?
maybe it's a typo on nearest description

Use the closest value (either before or behind) that was non null

Maybe what you want to say is: use the closest value (either before or after) that was non null?

[timroes]

Yeap that's what I want to say :)

So carry would turn [3, null, null, 5] into [3, 3, 3, 5], while nearest would result in [3, 3, 5, 5].

Update: extended the table above to hold an example for each fitting function.

[cjcenizal]

Can we also add an option so that the user can choose to interpret 0 values as null? For very good reasons, ES returns a null bucket value when there are no documents in the bucket for average/max/etc aggregations but a 0 bucket value for a sum aggregation.

As an example use case we may have the chart below, where the drop to 0 communicates unintended information, when we really want to treat those as null and just show no information at all.

[markov00]

I will leave here a comment for fixing this last comment: I think we should be careful on that and always check the bucket docs count before changing the sum value to 0. we can have buckets with 2 values with 0 sum that should be treated as a valid 0.

[nickofthyme]

How would end values be handled in this scenario? Specifically referring to Carry, Lookahead, Nearest, Average and Linear.

Would these values just be dropped from the dataset? Or assume 0 value for the missing previous/next value?

Example:

const nullStart = [null, 2, 5, 8];
const nullEnd = [2, 5, 8, null];

[nickofthyme]

@wylieconlon any thoughts on this ☝️

[wylieconlon]

@nickofthyme I think you're assuming that all of these fitting functions will return continuous data- as in we can draw a line between any values. Are there two types of fitting functions, one that is continuous and one that is discrete?

In the examples you mentioned, I would expect that a line chart based on the Carry function would draw a line that doesn't reach to the last bucket (unlike the chart above, which draws a path down to 0)

[sec-init]

Can another option be added for a Zero function? While Custom can certainly facilitate setting the null value to 0, I’d wager that users are looking for a 0 value more than anything else. This is especially true when performing count metrics over a date histogram on a line chart. [2, null, null, 8] would be rendered as [2, 0, 0, 8].

GH-6245 references this issue in more detail, but I’m not sure anything was ever concluded with it. Newer users shouldn’t be expected to input { "min_doc_count": 0 } to get the proper buckets displayed - or understand why that’s needed.

[nickofthyme]

@sec-init so rather than using the Explicit value option with 0 just using a Zero fit type?

[sec-init]

I would say in addition to Explicit value there should be a Zero value option, or something that satisfies the intent. The most commonly used explicit value will likely be 0, so making an option for it makes sense. I suspect that without an option in place for users to trial-and-error their way through (until successful), they’ll just assume Kibana/Visualizations aren’t capable of doing it correctly, regardless of Elasticsearch returning the appropriate response.

[piellick]

Hi everyone,
some news ? @timroes proposition look great, it could be usefull to apply this in visual builder's time serie module, no ?

[flash1293]

Removing Lens and elastic-charts labels as fitting functions are supported there by now

[timroes]

This feature is available since 7.9.0 in Lens (implemented via #69820).