Skip to content

Commit

Permalink
Polish readme
Browse files Browse the repository at this point in the history
  • Loading branch information
nx10 committed May 15, 2024
1 parent d9b0cf3 commit 95e4030
Showing 1 changed file with 5 additions and 4 deletions.
9 changes: 5 additions & 4 deletions README.md
Original file line number Diff line number Diff line change
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
# `actfast` Fast actigraphy data reader

`actfast` is a Python package for reading raw actigraphy data of various devices and manufacturers. It is designed to be lightweight, fast, and memory efficient, and is suitable for reading large datasets.
`actfast` is a Python package for reading raw actigraphy data of various devices and manufacturers. It is designed to be fast, lightweight, memory efficient, and suitable for reading large datasets.

## Supported devices

Expand All @@ -20,7 +20,8 @@ The package currently supports the following formats:
| CSV | Any | Any | Use general-purpose CSV reader |
| XLS, XLSX, ODS | Any | Any | Use general-purpose Excel reader |

This package exclusively reads non-standard files that contain sensor data. It does not read CSV or other standard file formats used by various manufacturers. Use any general-purpose CSV reader to read these files. Because CSV files do not necessarily contain a unique header, we cannot identify them from the file contents.
The scope of this package is limited to reading raw sensor
data. It does not read CSV or other standard file formats commonly used by various manufacturers. Use general-purpose libraries to read these files.

The package is designed to be easily extensible to support new formats and devices. If you have a non-standard device format that is not supported yet, please open an issue and attach a sample file. We will do our best to add support for it.

Expand Down Expand Up @@ -85,9 +86,9 @@ The returned dictionary has the following structure:

## Architecture & usage considerations

All supported formats seem to be constructed in a similar way: A header followed by a series of variable-length, variable-content records. While this stream of records is easy to write for the manufacturers, it is not ideal for vectorized operations. `actfast` collects data in linear buffers and then reshapes them into numpy arrays.
All supported formats seem to be constructed as streams of variable-length, variable-content records. While this stream of records is easy to write for the manufacturers, it is not ideal for vectorized operations. `actfast` collects data in contiguous arrays.

Consider reading large datasets once and storing them in a more efficient format (e.g., Parquet, HDF5) for subsequent analysis. This will reduce the time spent reading files and the memory footprint of the data dramatically.
Consider reading large datasets once and storing them in a more efficient format (e.g., Parquet, HDF5) for subsequent analysis. This will always speed up data reading and enable streaming data processing.

## License

Expand Down

0 comments on commit 95e4030

Please sign in to comment.