Formal model of time point-based sequential data for OLAP-like analysis

Numerous nowadays applications generate huge sets of data, whose natural feature is order, e.g,. sensor installations, RFID devices, workflow systems, Website monitors, health care applications. By analyzing the data and their order dependencies one can acquire new knowledge. However, nowadays commercial BI technologies and research prototypes allow to analyze mostly set oriented data, neglecting their order (sequential) dependencies. Few approaches to analyzing data of sequential nature have been proposed so far and all of them lack a comprehensive data model being able to represent and analyze sequential dependencies. In this paper, we propose a formal model for time point-based sequential data. The main elements of this model include an event and a sequence of events. Measures are associated with events and sequences. Measures are analyzed in the context set up by dimensions in an OLAP-like manner by means of the set of operations. The operations in our model are categorized as: operations on sequences, on dimensions, general operations, and analytical functions.