Overview

In this tutorial we will explore world events using the GDELT public data set of world news events. The data set contains 344 M rows (with 60 fields each) and is 24 GB when compressed & indexed by Hydrolix on AWS S3. The original data set size is challenging to calculate since it's in several zipped files, but our calculations approximate that the ingested size is about half the size of the GZIP'ed files.

GDELT Data Structure

The GDELT data structure described here. We converted the field names to lower snake case (actor1_name) and moved TIMEADDED to the timestamp field.

GDELT Columns and Types

Column	Data Type
timestamp	DateTime
global_event_id	String
day	String
month_year	String
year	String
fraction_date	String
actor1_code	String
actor1_name	String
actor1_country_code	String
actor1_known_group_code	String
actor1_ethnic_code	String
actor1_religion_code	String
actor1_religion2_code	String
actor1_type1_code	String
actor1_type2_code	String
actor1_type3_code	String
actor2_code	String
actor2_name	String
actor2_country_code	String
actor2_known_group_code	String
actor2_ethnic_code	String
actor2_religion_code	String
actor2_religion2_code	String
actor2_type1_code	String
actor2_type2_code	String
actor2_type3_code	String
is_root_event	UInt64
event_code	String
event_base_code	String
event_root_code	String
quad_class	UInt64
goldstein_scale	Float64
num_mentions	UInt64
num_sources	UInt64
num_articles	UInt64
avg_tone	Float64
actor1_geo_type	UInt64
actor1_geo_fullname	String
actor1_geo_country_code	String
actor1_adm1_code	String
actor1_adm2_code	String
actor1_geo_lat	Float64
actor1_geo_long	Float64
actor1_geo_feature_id	String
actor2_geo_type	UInt64
actor2_geo_fullname	String
actor2_geo_country_code	String
actor2_adm1_code	String
actor2_adm2_code	String
actor2_geo_lat	Float64
actor2_geo_long	Float64
actor2_geo_feature_id	String
action_geo_type	UInt64
action_geo_fullname	String
action_geo_country_code	String
action_adm1_code	String
action_adm2_code	String
action_geo_lat	Float64
action_geo_long	Float64
action_geo_feature_id	String
source_url	String

GDELT has used machine learning techniques to extract entity (actor1, actor2, action), sentiment/interest (goldstein, num_mentions, num_sources, num_articles, tone), geo location (lat/long, ISO codes) and categorization (event_code, quad_class, geo_code) from the world news.   

Working with time

The GDELT data has 5 fields to represent various time intervals

• TIMEADDED (YYYYMMDDHHMMSS UTC timezone)
• DAY (integer)
• MONTHYEAR (integer)
• YEAR (integer)
• FRACTIONDATE (floating point).

This feels excessive to a modern data engineer's eye. Hydrolix can derive all interval/date patterns from a single timestamp.

Transforms and Views in Hydrolix

Hydrolix allows for defining the data structure on ingest and query. 

A Transform is how data is written/ingested. It informs Hydrolix not only what data types are being written but also how the data should be treated. 

Gdelt

{
    "name": "transform_gdelt",
    "type": "csv",
    "table": "{{table_uuid}}",
    "settings": {
        "compression": "gzip",
        "is_default": true,
        "format_details": {
            "delimiter": "\t"
        },
        "output_columns": [
            {
                "name": "timestamp",
                "datatype": {
                    "primary": true,
                    "type": "datetime",
                    "format": "20060102150405",
                    "resolution": "seconds",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 0 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "global_event_id",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 1 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "day",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 2 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "month_year",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",                
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 3 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "year",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 4 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "fraction_date",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string"
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 5 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor1_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 6 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor1_name",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string"
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 7 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor1_country_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 8 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor1_known_group_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 9 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor1_ethnic_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 10 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor1_religion_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string"
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 11 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor1_religion2_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 12 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor1_type1_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 13 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor1_type2_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 14 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor1_type3_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 15 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor2_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 16 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor2_name",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 17 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor2_country_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 18 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor2_known_group_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 19 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor2_ethnic_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 20 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor2_religion_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 21 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor2_religion2_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 22 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor2_type1_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 23 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor2_type2_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 24 }                  
                }
                "position": 24
            },
            {
                "name": "actor2_type3_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 25 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "is_root_event",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "bool",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 26 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "event_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 27 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "event_base_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string"
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 28 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "event_root_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 29 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "quad_class",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "uint32",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 30 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "goldstein_scale",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "double",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 31 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "num_mentions",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "uint32",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 32 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "num_sources",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "uint32",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 33 }                  
                },
            },
            {
                "name": "num_articles",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "uint32",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 34 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "avg_tone",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "double",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 35 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor1_geo_type",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "uint32",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 36 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor1_geo_fullname",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 37 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor1_geo_country_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 3 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor1_adm1_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 39 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor1_adm2_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 40 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor1_geo_lat",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "double",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 41 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor1_geo_long",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "double",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 42 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor1_geo_feature_id",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 43 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor2_geo_type",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "uint32",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 44 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor2_geo_fullname",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 45 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor2_geo_country_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 46 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor2_adm1_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 47 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor2_adm2_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 48 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor2_geo_lat",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "double",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 49 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor2_geo_long",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "double",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 50 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "actor2_geo_feature_id",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 51 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "action_geo_type",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "uint32",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 52 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "action_geo_fullname",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 53 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "action_geo_country_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 54 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "action_adm1_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 55 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "action_adm2_code",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 56 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "action_geo_lat",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "double",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 57 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "action_geo_long",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "double",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 58 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "action_geo_feature_id",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 59 }                  
                }
            },
            {
                "name": "source_url",
                "datatype": {
                    "type": "string",
                    "source": { "from_input_index": 60 }                  
                }
            }
        ]
    }
}