business data processing - data processing in accounting or business management

data processing - (computer science) a series of operations on data by a computer in order to retrieve or
transform or classify information.

Computer data processing is any process that uses a computer program to enter data and
summarise, analyse or otherwise convert data into usable information. The process may be
automated and run on a computer. It involves recording, analysing, sorting, summarising,
calculating, disseminating and storing data. Because data is most useful when well-presented and
actually informative, data-processing systems are often referred to as information systems.
Nevertheless, the terms are roughly synonymous, performing similar conversions; data-
processing systems typically manipulate raw data into information, and likewise information
systems typically take raw data as input to produce information as output.

Data processing may or may not be distinguished from data conversion, when the process is
merely to convert data to another format, and does not involve any data manipulation.

Processing
Practically all naturally occurring processes can be viewed as examples of data processing
systems where "observable" information in the form of pressure, light, etc. are converted by
human observers into electrical signals in the nervous system as the senses we recognize as
touch, sound, and vision. Even the interaction of non-living systems may be viewed in this way
as rudimentary information processing systems. Conventional usage of the terms data
processing and information systems restricts their use to refer to the algorithmic derivations,
logical deductions, and statistical calculations that recur perennially in general business
environments, rather than in the more expansive sense of all conversions of real-world
measurements into real-world information in, say, an organic biological system or even a
scientific or engineering system.

Elements of data processing

In order to be processed by a computer, data needs first be converted into a machine readable
format. Once data is in digital format, various procedures can be applied on the data to get useful
information. Data processing may involve various processes, including:

 Data acquisition
 Data entry
 Data cleaning
 Data coding
 Data transformation
 Data translation
 Data summarization
 Data aggregation
 Data validation
  Data tabulation
 Statistical analysis
 Computer graphics
 Data warehousing
 Data mining
 Data fusion

3.4 Methods of data processing

The first step of the data processing is to convert the raw (logged) data into a time series
according to a particular averaging or summing period. The second step is to use these time
series for further calculations. Conversion and calculation methods are summarised in this
section.

The average of a finite sequence of samples is commonly defined as:

(3.1)

The standard deviation of a finite sequence of samples is defined as:

(3.2)

The standard deviation can also be calculated from the sum of the squared sample values (

):

(3.3)
The coefficient of determination , or correlation coefficient, of estimated values in relation

to their measured values is calculated by eq. 3.4 [Montgomery and Runger 1999, p. 464].

(3.4)

The averaging or summation period is denoted by , and called `clock period'. The start and
end of each period are synchronised with clock and calendar. The first clock period of a day
starts at 0h00.

3.4.1 Reference wind data

The output of the ultrasonic anemometers is directly given in a standard unit of velocity, for

every component ( , , ) (figure 3.10). One-minute averages and sums of squared output
values of the anemometer on the mast of the Auditorium are calculated and form the raw data.

For a chosen period , the mean wind speed components , and are calculated from the
one-minute data.

Next, these mean wind speed components are transformed into the global axis system (figure

2.4): , , . Furthermore, the quantities , , , , and can be calculated with the

definitions given in section 2.1.5.

3.4.2 Façade wind data

The raw data of the ultrasonic anemometer mounted on the boom at façade position P4 consists

of 1 second values ( , , ) (figure 3.10). From these, the -averaged quantities , ,

, , and are calculated.

3.4.3 Horizontal rain data

Horizontal rain data are obtained by three devices, two tipping-bucket rain gauges and a rain

indicator. The horizontal rain intensity during a clock period is calculated from the number of
tippings during this period:

(3.5)

with = the (uncorrected) horizontal rain intensity [mm h ], = the number of tips during [s],

= the effective volume [ml] of a bucket, and = the catchment area [m ] of the rain gauge.

In fact the horizontal rain intensity is an average during .

If the sample rate of the rain indicator is denoted by , the rain duration during a clock period

is calculated by:

(3.6)

with = the rain or precipitation duration [s] during , and = the number of samples at which
the rain indicator senses rain or other forms of precipitation during the clock period.
 Figure 3.20: Correction of rain intensity by combination of rain indicator data and tipping-bucket
data. See section 3.4.3 for an explanation.

Corrected horizontal rain intensity The data of the rain indicator and one of the rain
gauges can be combined to correct rain intensity data, especially during shorter averaging

periods . A method is presented in this section. The upper two graphs of figure 3.20 are
sketches of rain indicator and rain gauge readings as a function of time. The rain amount

registered by the first tipping in a period , could have been collected during previous clock
periods. The reading of the rain indicator can be of help to estimate how to `redistribute' this
amount over the previous periods. To prevent that rain is distributed over too many previous

periods, a minimum time is defined. This minimum time divides time into dry periods and
periods with more or less continuous rain (i.e. rain spells). The result of the redistribution of rain
amounts of the registered tippings is sketched in figure 3.20c. The redistribution is done in
proportion to the precipitation times measured by the rain indicator. Summing up the

redistributed rain amounts per clock period yields the so-called corrected rain intensity

(figure 3.20d). For comparison, the uncorrected rain intensity calculated with eq. 3.5 is
sketched in figure 3.20e.

3.4.4 Raindrop spectrum data

Every 30 s, the disdrometer reports the mean particle velocity in every size class and the particle

number concentration in every size class. We will denote these quantities with [m s ]

and [m m ], respectively. The raindrop mass flux per drop size class per 30 s (
[kg m (30 s) ]) can be calculated from these two quantities by (cf. eq. 2.15 and 2.16):

(3.7)

with and = the centre and interval of the drop size class in m (table 3.4), and = density [kg m
] of water.

The reported spectra are only taken into account if the disdrometer indicates that the precipitation
is drizzle or rain. So, spectra of snow, hail and mixtures are discarded.

The disdrometer output has two disadvantages for our purposes. Firstly, the disdrometer gives
the raindrop number concentration spectrum, which is calculated from the quantity which we are
interested in, namely the raindrop mass flux spectrum. We have to `recalculate' the raindrop mass

flux spectrum by use of the given averaged particle velocities . Secondly, the interval of
the size classes increases with the centre diameter, which results in larger absolute errors of the
real mass flux at larger diameters. The two disadvantages can be solved by outputting every
detected raindrop with its diameter and velocity, but it was not possible to us to adapt the
software in the data processing unit of the disdrometer.

3.4.5 Driving rain data of the TUE-I and TUE-II gauges

In gauges TUE-I and TUE-II, the driving rain collected in a reservoir is measured by a balance,

of which simply the weight values are logged. The (mean) driving rain intensity during a

clock period is calculated from the difference between begin and end values of the logged
mass:

(3.8)
 (3.9)

with = a threshold value [kg] for the minimum detectable mass difference during a clock period,

= the catchment area [m ] of the driving rain gauge, and = the clock period in h.

By the threshold value one suppresses variations of the measured mass value due to e.g.

temperature changes. It depends on the resolution of the balance ( = 0.105 g was found
suitable for the applied balances with a resolution of 0.1 g).

3.4.6 Driving rain data of the CTH and DTU gauges

The number of tippings of the CTH driving rain gauge is logged two times per second. The

driving rain intensity can be calculated similar to , eq. 3.5.

The raw data of the DTU gauge consists of voltage values of the strain gauge. The data
processing method was already mentioned in section 3.2.6. The resulting driving rain intensity is
calculated from the difference of the 10-min averaged masses, of two subsequent 10-min clock
periods, similar to eq. 3.9. Driving rain intensities for larger clock periods are calculated from the
obtained 10-min driving rain intensities.