A Review of Open Source Software Tools for Time Series Analysis

Time series data is used in a wide range of real world applications. In a variety of domains , detailed analysis of time series data (via Forecasting and Anomaly Detection) leads to a better understanding of how events associated with a specific time instance behave. Time Series Analysis (TSA) is commonly performed with plots and traditional models. Machine Learning (ML) approaches , on the other hand , have seen an increase in the state of the art for Forecasting and Anomaly Detection because they provide comparable results when time and data constraints are met. A number of time series toolboxes are available that offer rich interfaces to specific model classes (ARIMA/filters , neural networks) or framework interfaces to isolated time series modelling tasks (forecasting , feature extraction , annotation , classification). Nonetheless , open source machine learning capabilities for time series remain limited , and existing libraries are frequently incompatible with one another. The goal of this paper is to provide a concise and user friendly overview of the most important open source tools for time series analysis. This article examines two related toolboxes (1) forecasting and (2) anomaly detection. This paper describes a typical Time Series Analysis (TSA) framework with an architecture and lists the main features of TSA framework. The tools are categorized based on the criteria of analysis tasks completed , data preparation methods employed , and evaluation methods for results generated. This paper presents quantitative analysis and discusses the current state of actively developed open source Time Series Analysis frameworks. Overall , this article considered 60 time series analysis tools , and 32 of which provided forecasting modules , and 21 packages included anomaly detection.