=head1 NAME rrdgraph_rpn - About RPN Math in rrdtool graph =head1 SYNOPSIS I:=I|I|I[,I] =head1 DESCRIPTION If you have ever used a traditional HP calculator you already know B (Reverse Polish Notation). The idea behind B is that you have a stack and push your data onto this stack. Whenever you execute an operation, it takes as many elements from the stack as needed. Pushing is done implicitly, so whenever you specify a number or a variable, it gets pushed onto the stack automatically. At the end of the calculation there should be one and only one value left on the stack. This is the outcome of the function and this is what is put into the I. For B instructions, the stack is processed for each data point on the graph. B instructions work on an entire data set in one run. Note, that currently B instructions only support a limited list of functions. Example: C This will set variable "maximum" which you now can use in the rest of your RRD script. Example: C This means: push variable I, push the number 8, execute the operator I<*>. The operator needs two elements and uses those to return one value. This value is then stored in I. As you may have guessed, this instruction means nothing more than I. The real power of B lies in the fact that it is always clear in which order to process the input. For expressions like C you need to multiply 3 with 5 first before you add I to get I. However, with parentheses you could change this order: C. In B, you would do C without the need for parentheses. =head1 OPERATORS =over 4 =item Boolean operators B Pop two elements from the stack, compare them for the selected condition and return 1 for true or 0 for false. Comparing an I or an I value will always result in 0 (false). B Pop one element from the stack, compare this to I respectively to I. Returns 1 for true or 0 for false. B Pops three elements from the stack. If the element popped last is 0 (false), the value popped first is pushed back onto the stack, otherwise the value popped second is pushed back. This does, indeed, mean that any value other than 0 is considered to be true. Example: C should be read as C Z<> =item Comparing values B Pops two elements from the stack and returns the smaller or larger, respectively. Note that I is larger than anything else. If one of the input numbers is I then the result of the operation will be I too. B Pops two elements from the stack and uses them to define a range. Then it pops another element and if it falls inside the range, it is pushed back. If not, an I is pushed. The range defined includes the two boundaries (so: a number equal to one of the boundaries will be pushed back). If any of the three numbers involved is either I or I this function will always return an I Example: C will return I if alpha is lower than 0 or if it is higher than 100. Z<> =item Arithmetics B<+, -, *, /, %> Add, subtract, multiply, divide, modulo B NAN-safe addition. If one parameter is NAN/UNKNOWN it'll be treated as zero. If both parameters are NAN/UNKNOWN, NAN/UNKNOWN will be returned. B Sine and cosine (input in radians), log and exp (natural logarithm), square root. B Arctangent (output in radians). B Arctangent of y,x components (output in radians). This pops one element from the stack, the x (cosine) component, and then a second, which is the y (sine) component. It then pushes the arctangent of their ratio, resolving the ambiguity between quadrants. Example: C will convert C components into an angle in degrees. B Round down or up to the nearest integer. B Convert angle in degrees to radians, or radians to degrees. B Take the absolute value. =item Set Operations B Pop one element from the stack. This is the I of items to be sorted (or reversed). The top I of the remaining elements are then sorted (or reversed) in place on the stack. Example: C will compute the average of the values v1 to v6 after removing the smallest and largest. B Pop one element (I) from the stack. Now pop I elements and build the average, ignoring all UNKNOWN values in the process. Example: C B Create a "sliding window" average of another data series. Usage: CDEF:smoothed=x,1800,TREND This will create a half-hour (1800 second) sliding window average of x. The average is essentially computed as shown here: +---!---!---!---!---!---!---!---!---> now delay t0 <---------------> delay t1 <---------------> delay t2 <---------------> Value at sample (t0) will be the average between (t0-delay) and (t0) Value at sample (t1) will be the average between (t1-delay) and (t1) Value at sample (t2) will be the average between (t2-delay) and (t2) TRENDNAN is - in contrast to TREND - NAN-safe. If you use TREND and one source value is NAN the complete sliding window is affected. The TRENDNAN operation ignores all NAN-values in a sliding window and computes the average of the remaining values. B Create a "sliding window" average/sigma of another data series, that also shifts the data series by given amounts of of time as well Usage - explicit stating shifts: CDEF:predict=,...,,n,,x,PREDICT CDEF:sigma=,...,,n,,x,PREDICTSIGMA Usage - shifts defined as a base shift and a number of time this is applied CDEF:predict=,-n,,x,PREDICT CDEF:sigma=,-n,,x,PREDICTSIGMA Example: CDEF:predict=172800,86400,2,1800,x,PREDICT This will create a half-hour (1800 second) sliding window average/sigma of x, that average is essentially computed as shown here: +---!---!---!---!---!---!---!---!---!---!---!---!---!---!---!---!---!---> now shift 1 t0 <-----------------------> window <---------------> shift 2 <-----------------------------------------------> window <---------------> shift 1 t1 <-----------------------> window <---------------> shift 2 <-----------------------------------------------> window <---------------> Value at sample (t0) will be the average between (t0-shift1-window) and (t0-shift1) and between (t0-shift2-window) and (t0-shift2) Value at sample (t1) will be the average between (t1-shift1-window) and (t1-shift1) and between (t1-shift2-window) and (t1-shift2) The function is by design NAN-safe. This also allows for extrapolation into the future (say a few days) - you may need to define the data series whit the optional start= parameter, so that the source data series has enough data to provide prediction also at the beginning of a graph... Here an example, that will create a 10 day graph that also shows the prediction 3 days into the future with its uncertainty value (as defined by avg+-4*sigma) This also shows if the prediction is exceeded at a certain point. rrdtool graph image.png --imgformat=PNG \ --start=-7days --end=+3days --width=1000 --height=200 --alt-autoscale-max \ DEF:value=value.rrd:value:AVERAGE:start=-14days \ LINE1:value#ff0000:value \ CDEF:predict=86400,-7,1800,value,PREDICT \ CDEF:sigma=86400,-7,1800,value,PREDICTSIGMA \ CDEF:upper=predict,sigma,3,*,+ \ CDEF:lower=predict,sigma,3,*,- \ LINE1:predict#00ff00:prediction \ LINE1:upper#0000ff:upper\ certainty\ limit \ LINE1:lower#0000ff:lower\ certainty\ limit \ CDEF:exceeds=value,UN,0,value,lower,upper,LIMIT,UN,IF \ TICK:exceeds#aa000080:1 Note: Experience has shown that a factor between 3 and 5 to scale sigma is a good discriminator to detect abnormal behaviour. This obviously depends also on the type of data and how "noisy" the data series is. This prediction can only be used for short term extrapolations - say a few days into the future- =item Special values B Pushes an unknown value on the stack B Pushes a positive or negative infinite value on the stack. When such a value is graphed, it appears at the top or bottom of the graph, no matter what the actual value on the y-axis is. B Pushes an I value if this is the first value of a data set or otherwise the result of this B at the previous time step. This allows you to do calculations across the data. This function cannot be used in B instructions. B Pushes an I value if this is the first value of a data set or otherwise the result of the vname variable at the previous time step. This allows you to do calculations across the data. This function cannot be used in B instructions. B Pushes the number 1 if this is the first value of the data set, the number 2 if it is the second, and so on. This special value allows you to make calculations based on the position of the value within the data set. This function cannot be used in B instructions. =item Time Time inside RRDtool is measured in seconds since the epoch. The epoch is defined to be S>. B Pushes the current time on the stack. B