Pandas Dataframe: get unique values from a timestamp column

Question

I have time series data that looks like:

1998-01-02 09:30:00,0.4298,0.4337,0.4258,0.4317,6426369
1999-01-02 09:45:00,0.4317,0.4337,0.4258,0.4298,10589080
2000-01-02 10:00:00,0.4298,0.4337,0.4278,0.4337,9507980
2001-01-02 10:15:00,0.4337,0.4416,0.4298,0.4416,13639022

What I want is a list of years,

years = list['1998'.'1999','2000','2001']

So I can use that list to know what years I can query against in that dataframe. Not all dataframes will have the same years in it.

data = pd.read_csv(str(inFileName), index_col=0, parse_dates=True, header=None)
  
  #data.iloc[:, 0]

print(pd.DatetimeIndex(data.iloc[:, 0]).year)

  #print(data.iloc[:, 0])

  #years = list(data.index)
  #print(years)

  for x in years:

I am trying so many things, but not succeeding. Can someone explain to me how to solve a problem like this?

Edit 1: After some advice, I am doing this:

data = pd.read_csv(str(inFileName), parse_dates=[0], header=None)
  data.iloc[:, 0] = pd.to_datetime(data.iloc[:, 0])
  data['year'] = data.iloc[:, 0].apply(lambda x: x.year)
  year_list = data['year'].unique().tolist()
  print(year_list)
  for x in year_list:
    newDF = data[x]
    newDF.head()

    print(newDF.head(5))

and I get the list: [2017, 2018, 2019]

but I cannot create a new dataframe from the list. I want to create a new dataframe for each value in the list. I get errors:

[2017, 2018, 2019]

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/home/jason/Applications/anaconda3/lib/python3.7/site-packages/pandas/core/indexes/base.py", line 3078, in get_loc
    return self._engine.get_loc(key)
  File "pandas/_libs/index.pyx", line 140, in pandas._libs.index.IndexEngine.get_loc
  File "pandas/_libs/index.pyx", line 162, in pandas._libs.index.IndexEngine.get_loc
  File "pandas/_libs/hashtable_class_helper.pxi", line 1492, in pandas._libs.hashtable.PyObjectHashTable.get_item
  File "pandas/_libs/hashtable_class_helper.pxi", line 1500, in pandas._libs.hashtable.PyObjectHashTable.get_item
KeyError: 2017

During handling of the above exception, another exception occurred:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "./massageSM.py", line 123, in <module>
    main(sys.argv[1:])
  File "./massageSM.py", line 33, in main
    newDF = data[x]
  File "/home/jason/Applications/anaconda3/lib/python3.7/site-packages/pandas/core/frame.py", line 2688, in __getitem__
    return self._getitem_column(key)
  File "/home/jason/Applications/anaconda3/lib/python3.7/site-packages/pandas/core/frame.py", line 2695, in _getitem_column
    return self._get_item_cache(key)
  File "/home/jason/Applications/anaconda3/lib/python3.7/site-packages/pandas/core/generic.py", line 2489, in _get_item_cache
    values = self._data.get(item)
  File "/home/jason/Applications/anaconda3/lib/python3.7/site-packages/pandas/core/internals.py", line 4115, in get
    loc = self.items.get_loc(item)
  File "/home/jason/Applications/anaconda3/lib/python3.7/site-packages/pandas/core/indexes/base.py", line 3080, in get_loc
    return self._engine.get_loc(self._maybe_cast_indexer(key))
  File "pandas/_libs/index.pyx", line 140, in pandas._libs.index.IndexEngine.get_loc
  File "pandas/_libs/index.pyx", line 162, in pandas._libs.index.IndexEngine.get_loc
  File "pandas/_libs/hashtable_class_helper.pxi", line 1492, in pandas._libs.hashtable.PyObjectHashTable.get_item
  File "pandas/_libs/hashtable_class_helper.pxi", line 1500, in pandas._libs.hashtable.PyObjectHashTable.get_item
KeyError: 2017

Edit 2

I am using this:

data = pd.read_csv("RHE.SM", parse_dates=[0], header=None)
data.iloc[:, 0] = pd.to_datetime(data.iloc[:, 0])
data['year'] = data.iloc[:, 0].apply(lambda x: x.year)
year_list = data['year'].unique().tolist()
print(year_list)
  
for x in year_list:
    df = pd.DataFrame({'years':year_list})
    
    print(df.head(5))

and it produces output:

[2017, 2018, 2019]
   years
0   2017
1   2018
2   2019
   years
0   2017
1   2018
2   2019
   years
0   2017
1   2018
2   2019

but what I want is to create: dataframe with just 2017 dataframe with just 2018 dataframe with just 2019

but I can't hard code this because other files wont contain the same years. I need to make a list of what years are available and iterate through it.

Edit 3:

I have also tried:

data = pd.read_csv("RHE.SM", header=None, parse_dates=[0])
year_list = data[0].dt.year.unique().tolist()
print(year_list)
data.index = pd.DatetimeIndex(data[0])
print(type(data.index))
print(data.index)

for x in year_list:
    print(x)
    newDF = data[x]
    #newDF.head()

    #print(newDF.head(5))

I get the following output, which starts good but then I get an error creating the newDF.

[2017, 2018, 2019]
<class 'pandas.core.indexes.datetimes.DatetimeIndex'>
DatetimeIndex(['2017-10-02 10:15:00', '2017-10-02 10:30:00',
               '2017-10-02 10:45:00', '2017-10-02 11:00:00',
               '2017-10-02 11:15:00', '2017-10-02 11:30:00',
               '2017-10-02 11:45:00', '2017-10-02 12:00:00',
               '2017-10-02 12:15:00', '2017-10-02 12:30:00',
               ...
               '2019-01-03 14:45:00', '2019-01-03 15:00:00',
               '2019-01-03 15:15:00', '2019-01-03 15:30:00',
               '2019-01-03 15:45:00', '2019-01-03 16:00:00',
               '2019-01-03 16:30:00', '2019-01-03 16:45:00',
               '2019-01-03 17:15:00', '2019-01-03 18:30:00'],
              dtype='datetime64[ns]', name=0, length=8685, freq=None)
2017

---------------------------------------------------------------------------
KeyError                                  Traceback (most recent call last)
~/Applications/anaconda3/lib/python3.7/site-packages/pandas/core/indexes/base.py in get_loc(self, key, method, tolerance)
   3077             try:
-> 3078                 return self._engine.get_loc(key)
   3079             except KeyError:

pandas/_libs/index.pyx in pandas._libs.index.IndexEngine.get_loc()

pandas/_libs/index.pyx in pandas._libs.index.IndexEngine.get_loc()

pandas/_libs/hashtable_class_helper.pxi in pandas._libs.hashtable.Int64HashTable.get_item()

pandas/_libs/hashtable_class_helper.pxi in pandas._libs.hashtable.Int64HashTable.get_item()

KeyError: 2017

During handling of the above exception, another exception occurred:

KeyError                                  Traceback (most recent call last)
<ipython-input-19-f31493ccbf2a> in <module>
      9 for x in year_list:
     10     print(x)
---> 11     newDF = data[x]
     12     #newDF.head()
     13 

~/Applications/anaconda3/lib/python3.7/site-packages/pandas/core/frame.py in __getitem__(self, key)
   2686             return self._getitem_multilevel(key)
   2687         else:
-> 2688             return self._getitem_column(key)
   2689 
   2690     def _getitem_column(self, key):

~/Applications/anaconda3/lib/python3.7/site-packages/pandas/core/frame.py in _getitem_column(self, key)
   2693         # get column
   2694         if self.columns.is_unique:
-> 2695             return self._get_item_cache(key)
   2696 
   2697         # duplicate columns & possible reduce dimensionality

~/Applications/anaconda3/lib/python3.7/site-packages/pandas/core/generic.py in _get_item_cache(self, item)
   2487         res = cache.get(item)
   2488         if res is None:
-> 2489             values = self._data.get(item)
   2490             res = self._box_item_values(item, values)
   2491             cache[item] = res

~/Applications/anaconda3/lib/python3.7/site-packages/pandas/core/internals.py in get(self, item, fastpath)
   4113 
   4114             if not isna(item):
-> 4115                 loc = self.items.get_loc(item)
   4116             else:
   4117                 indexer = np.arange(len(self.items))[isna(self.items)]

~/Applications/anaconda3/lib/python3.7/site-packages/pandas/core/indexes/base.py in get_loc(self, key, method, tolerance)
   3078                 return self._engine.get_loc(key)
   3079             except KeyError:
-> 3080                 return self._engine.get_loc(self._maybe_cast_indexer(key))
   3081 
   3082         indexer = self.get_indexer([key], method=method, tolerance=tolerance)

pandas/_libs/index.pyx in pandas._libs.index.IndexEngine.get_loc()

pandas/_libs/index.pyx in pandas._libs.index.IndexEngine.get_loc()

pandas/_libs/hashtable_class_helper.pxi in pandas._libs.hashtable.Int64HashTable.get_item()

pandas/_libs/hashtable_class_helper.pxi in pandas._libs.hashtable.Int64HashTable.get_item()

KeyError: 2017

Answer 1

I have not tested this but I think it will work for you.

data.iloc[:, 0] = pd.to_datetime(data.iloc[:, 0])
data['year'] = data.iloc[:, 0].apply(lambda x: x.year)
year_list = data['year'].unique().tolist()

It first converts the first column to a DateTime format. Then it creates a new column with only the year component of each DateTime. Finally, it will output a list of every unique value in that column.

If you also want to convert the resulting list to a new dataframe simply add this line after:

df = pd.DataFrame({'years':year_list})

edit If you want to convert each individual item in the list to a new dataframe you could add this instead:

df = []
for x in year_list:
    df.append(pd.DataFrame({'years':[x]}))