TimeSeries for non-temporal data

Question

Mathematica introduced TemporalData in Mathematica 9. Mathematica 10 added several fantastic new TimeSeries manipulation tools -- tools that would come in handy for non-temporal data.

For example, I would love to use Resampling, MovingAverage, TimeSeriesAggregate, etc on wavelength scans, ie Fluorescence Intensity vs wavelength. At the moment, I have been treating wavelength as AbsoluteTime values.

filter = TimeSeries[{{0.525, 0.}, {0.526, 0.}, {0.527, 0.}, {0.528, 
     0.}, {0.529, 0.}, {0.53, 0.001}, {0.531, 0.001}, {0.532, 
     0.002}, {0.533, 0.002}, {0.534, 0.003}, {0.535, 0.004}, {0.536, 
     0.006}, {0.537, 0.01}, {0.538, 0.015}, {0.539, 0.026}, {0.54, 
     0.046}, {0.541, 0.092}, {0.542, 0.132}, {0.542, 0.189}, {0.542, 
     0.256}, {0.543, 0.361}, {0.544, 0.464}, {0.544, 0.556}, {0.544, 
     0.618}, {0.545, 0.644}, {0.546, 0.644}, {0.546, 0.626}, {0.546, 
     0.605}, {0.547, 0.575}, {0.548, 0.533}, {0.548, 0.476}, {0.548, 
     0.396}, {0.549, 0.324}, {0.55, 0.241}, {0.55, 0.178}, {0.55, 
     0.13}, {0.551, 0.094}, {0.552, 0.069}, {0.552, 0.051}, {0.553, 
     0.03}, {0.554, 0.019}, {0.555, 0.012}, {0.556, 0.008}, {0.557, 
     0.006}, {0.558, 0.004}, {0.559, 0.003}, {0.56, 0.002}, {0.561, 
     0.002}, {0.562, 0.001}, {0.563, 0.001}, {0.564, 0.001}, {0.565, 
     0.}, {0.566, 0.}, {0.567, 0.}, {0.568, 0.}, {0.569, 0.}, {0.570, 
     0.}, {0.571, 0.}, {0.572, 0.}, {0.573, 0.}, {0.574, 0.}, {0.575, 
     0.}}];
filter["Times"][[1 ;; 4]]
DateString /@ filter["Dates"][[1 ;; 4]]

Yields

{0.525, 0.526, 0.527, 0.528}
{"Mon 1 Jan 1900 00:00:00", "Mon 1 Jan 1900 00:00:00", "Mon 1 Jan \
1900 00:00:00", "Mon 1 Jan 1900 00:00:00"}

It appears to work, but it seems a bit of a kludge. Is there an equivalent Series that allows non-temporal independent variable with appropriate units?

Answer 1

I'll go into this answer admitting it's not ideal, because I also haven't found anything that packages non-temporal data as nicely as TimeSeries does. And maybe you already know that there are plenty of built-in functions that replicate the behavior of TimeSeriesResample, MovingAverage, TimeSeriesAggregate, etc. for non-temporal data arrays. But one of the things I love about Mathematica is the workhorse list of lists data structure. So my answer really just shows the function equivalents to the ones you mentioned for a straightforward two-dimensional array. Apologies if it's not a real answer for you, but here are the examples of the functions in which you specifically expressed interest.

(* TimeSeriesResample *)
resampledFilter = ArrayResample[filter, {2 Length[filter], 2}];
(* MovingAverage *)
movingAveragedFilter = MovingAverage[filter, 2];
(* TimeSeriesAggregate *)
movingMapped = MovingMap[StandardDeviation, filter, Quantity[3, "Events"]];

ListLinePlot[{filter, resampledFilter, movingAveragedFilter, movingMapped},
    ImageSize -> Large,
    PlotLegends -> LineLegend[{"original", "resampled", "moving averaged", "moving mapped SD"}]
]