Combining time series data with different resolution in R - r

Question

I have read in and formatted my data set like shown under.
library(xts)
#Read data from file
x <- read.csv("data.dat", header=F)
x[is.na(x)] <- c(0) #If empty fill in zero
#Construct data frames
rawdata.h <- data.frame(x[,2],x[,3],x[,4],x[,5],x[,6],x[,7],x[,8]) #Hourly data
rawdata.15min <- data.frame(x[,10]) #15 min data
#Convert time index to proper format
index.h <- as.POSIXct(strptime(x[,1], "%d.%m.%Y %H:%M"))
index.15min <- as.POSIXct(strptime(x[,9], "%d.%m.%Y %H:%M"))
#Set column names
names(rawdata.h) <- c("spot","RKup", "RKdown","RKcon","anm", "pp.stat","prod.h")
names(rawdata.15min) <- c("prod.15min")
#Convert data frames to time series objects
data.htemp <- xts(rawdata.h,order.by=index.h)
data.15mintemp <- xts(rawdata.15min,order.by=index.15min)
#Select desired subset period
data.h <- data.htemp["2013"]
data.15min <- data.15mintemp["2013"]
I want to be able to combine hourly data from data.h$prod.h with data, with 15 min resolution, from data.15min$prod.15min corresponding to the same hour.
An example would be to take the average of the hourly value at time 2013-12-01 00:00-01:00 with the last 15 minute value in that same hour, i.e. the 15 minute value from time 2013-12-01 00:45-01:00. I'm looking for a flexible way to do this with an arbitrary hour.
Any suggestions?
Edit: Just to clarify further: I want to do something like this:
N <- NROW(data.h$prod.h)
for (i in 1:N){
prod.average[i] <- mean(data.h$prod.h[i] + #INSERT CODE THAT FINDS LAST 15 MIN IN HOUR i )
}

Answer 1

I found a solution to my problem by converting the 15 minute data into hourly data using the very useful .index* function from the xts package like shown under.
prod.new <- data.15min$prod.15min[.indexmin(data.15min$prod.15min) %in% c(45:59)]
This creates a new time series with only the values occuring in the 45-59 minute interval each hour.
For those curious my data looked like this:
Original hourly series:
> data.h$prod.h[1:4]
2013-01-01 00:00:00 19.744
2013-01-01 01:00:00 27.866
2013-01-01 02:00:00 26.227
2013-01-01 03:00:00 16.013
Original 15 minute series:
> data.15min$prod.15min[1:4]
2013-09-30 00:00:00 16.4251
2013-09-30 00:15:00 18.4495
2013-09-30 00:30:00 7.2125
2013-09-30 00:45:00 12.1913
2013-09-30 01:00:00 12.4606
2013-09-30 01:15:00 12.7299
2013-09-30 01:30:00 12.9992
2013-09-30 01:45:00 26.7522
New series with only the last 15 minutes in each hour:
> prod.new[1:4]
2013-09-30 00:45:00 12.1913
2013-09-30 01:45:00 26.7522
2013-09-30 02:45:00 5.0332
2013-09-30 03:45:00 2.6974

Answer 2

Short answer
df %>%
group_by(t = cut(time, "30 min")) %>%
summarise(v = mean(value))
Long answer
Since, you want to compress the 15 minutes time series to a smaller resolution (30 minutes), you should use dplyr package or any other package that computes the "group by" concept.
For instance:
s = seq(as.POSIXct("2017-01-01"), as.POSIXct("2017-01-02"), "15 min")
df = data.frame(time = s, value=1:97)
df is a time series with 97 rows and two columns.
head(df)
time value
1 2017-01-01 00:00:00 1
2 2017-01-01 00:15:00 2
3 2017-01-01 00:30:00 3
4 2017-01-01 00:45:00 4
5 2017-01-01 01:00:00 5
6 2017-01-01 01:15:00 6
The cut.POSIXt, group_by and summarise functions do the work:
df %>%
group_by(t = cut(time, "30 min")) %>%
summarise(v = mean(value))
t v
1 2017-01-01 00:00:00 1.5
2 2017-01-01 00:30:00 3.5
3 2017-01-01 01:00:00 5.5
4 2017-01-01 01:30:00 7.5
5 2017-01-01 02:00:00 9.5
6 2017-01-01 02:30:00 11.5

Answer 3

A more robust way is to convert 15 minutes values into hourly values by taking average. Then do whatever operation you want to.
### 15 Minutes Data
min15 <- structure(list(V1 = structure(1:8, .Label = c("2013-01-01 00:00:00",
"2013-01-01 00:15:00", "2013-01-01 00:30:00", "2013-01-01 00:45:00",
"2013-01-01 01:00:00", "2013-01-01 01:15:00", "2013-01-01 01:30:00",
"2013-01-01 01:45:00"), class = "factor"), V2 = c(16.4251, 18.4495,
7.2125, 12.1913, 12.4606, 12.7299, 12.9992, 26.7522)), .Names = c("V1",
"V2"), class = "data.frame", row.names = c(NA, -8L))
min15
### Hourly Data
hourly <- structure(list(V1 = structure(1:4, .Label = c("2013-01-01 00:00:00",
"2013-01-01 01:00:00", "2013-01-01 02:00:00", "2013-01-01 03:00:00"
), class = "factor"), V2 = c(19.744, 27.866, 26.227, 16.013)), .Names = c("V1",
"V2"), class = "data.frame", row.names = c(NA, -4L))
hourly
### Convert 15min data into hourly data by taking average of 4 values
min15$V1 <- as.POSIXct(min15$V1,origin="1970-01-01 0:0:0")
min15 <- aggregate(. ~ cut(min15$V1,"60 min"),min15[setdiff(names(min15), "V1")],mean)
min15
names(min15) <- c("time","min15")
names(hourly) <- c("time","hourly")
### merge the corresponding values
combined <- merge(hourly,min15)
### average of hourly and 15min values
rowMeans(combined[,2:3])