Smoothing Adjustment

[captainkirkby]

Now that averaging is implemented, the number of data points on the screen is variable and the smoothing checkbox should either give the user a slider to determine how much to smooth the data by, "smartly" decide on an optimal smoothing value, or both.

[captainkirkby]

"When looking at graphs over longer periods we’ve used the smoothing option which certainly makes trends clearer, but we were wondering exactly what the algorithm used was. At either end of the graphs you tend to get “funny” bits, presumably where the average is incorporating non-existent data. It would probably be better to truncate the display so that we can absolutely trust what we can see."

I think what's making them jumpy is when the data appears to change on the edges in real time.

What is happening here is this: on the edges the amount of smoothing tapers to zero as less and less surrounding data points are available. As the amount of smoothing changes, the smoothed value changes.

They have suggested that we truncate the smoothed data so this doesn't happen. I think the main thing is that as the smoothed data marches along, it doesn't change and freak users out.

[captainkirkby]

Truncated Display implemented. Now any data point that doesn't have enough neighbors to do an average is not included in the "smoothed" graph.