Trends, Forecasts, Clusters Flashcards
True/False: You can show seasonality in a line chart with a trend line.
Hint: seasonality means that there are repeated patterns (i.e. there is always a spike in December)
False, you wouldn’t use a trend line b/c a trend line would not show repeated patterns.
See image 1
Bonus: You could use forecasting
When the repeated pattern correlates with itself, it’s known as ______.
Autocorrelation
See image 2
MASE means ____ & its equation is ___.
Mean absolute scaled error
MAE model forecast/MAE naive forecast
MAE is ____.
Mean absolute error
A MASE close to zero means ___.
Your model is really accurate in predicting the future.
MASE = 0.5 means ___.
Your forecast is likely to have half as much error as a naive forecast.
What is better, a MASE of 1 or 0.5?
What does each mean?
0.5
0.5 means that your forecast error is likely less than that of a naive forecast
1 means that your forecast is as accurate as a naive forecast
A MASE close to 1 means ___.
Your model is similar to the naive forecast.
i.e. your forecast is no better than a naive forecast
A MASE more than 1 means ____.
Your model is worse than the naive forecast.
A MASE of 0.65 means ____.
Is this acceptable?
Your model has a 65% error of the naive model.
Yes.
See image 2.
What would happen to the MASE if the peak of interest didn’t happen in April 2020?
The MASE would be lower, meaning your model would be more accurate.
Because Tableau uses ____ in Forecasting, Forecasting is more influenced by ___ values than ___ values.
Exponential smoothing
Recent
Past
Forecasting in Tableau uses a technique known as exponential smoothing. Its formula shows that predictions will be influenced more by recent values than the past.
How is MAE calculated?
The absolute difference between the Actual and Forecast values then takes the mean of those values.
See image 3
What is the Naive Forecasting Method?
The Forecast is the last observed value.
See image 4
True/False: The Naive Forecasting method is oversimplified, but very cost-effective.
True
Naive Forecasting can be better than other complex forecasting models because ____.
Although it’s oversimplified, it’s very cost-effective.
What field/s do you need for a forecast?
Date field and a measure
Bonus: Alternative to date field: a dimension with integer values (This is uncommon)
Instead of having a date field and a measure, what can you replace the date field with for a Forecast?
A dimension with integer values (This is uncommon).
What is the difference between trend and seasonality?
Trend is a tendency in the data to increase or decrease over time.
Seasonality is a repeating, predictable variation in value.
True/False: A MASE of 1 means that you have a perfect model.
False
True/False: Predicting the amount of stock in your warehouse can be done with forecasting.
True
When creating a forecast, Tableau automatically creates a gap between the actual and predicted values. How can you close the gap?
Change the Forecast indicator to an attribute.
Bonus: See “Forecast” in colors mark > drop-down arrow > Change “Dimension” to “Attribute”
Note that this cannot be found on the Analysis Tab.
How can you find how accurate is a forecast?
How can you find the accuracy of a forecast value?
1) Look at “Quality” or MASE in “Describe Forcast” (NOT p-value)
Steps: Find in “Analyst” tab or
right click data point in the forecast > “Forecast” > “Describe Forecast” > see Quality in the Summary tab or MASE in the Models tab
2) Look at Precision/Precions %
Steps: Change column measure to Precision/% or
Add Precision/% to tooltip
Tooltip Steps:
Drag y to Marks Tooltip > click arrow > Forecast results > Precision/%
See image 5
How can you change the Forecast length?
Change it in the “Forecast Options” menu.
Image 6
Bonus: Right click forecast > “Forecast” > “Forecast Options”