robslopes: Efficient Computation of the (Repeated) Median Slope

J. Raymaekers*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalEditorialAcademicpeer-review

Abstract

Modern use of slope estimation often involves the (repeated) estimation of a large number of slopes on a large number of data points. Some of the most popular non-parametric and robust alternatives to the least squares estimator are the Theil-Sen and Siegel's repeated median slope estimators. The robslopes package contains fast algorithms for these slope estimators. The implemented randomized algorithms run in O(n log(n)) and O(n log(2)(n)) expected time respectively and use O(n) space. They achieve speedups up to a factor 103 compared with existing implementations for common sample sizes, as illustrated in a benchmark study, and they allow for the possibility of estimating the slopes on samples of size 105 and larger thanks to the limited space usage. Finally, the original algorithms are adjusted in order to properly handle duplicate values in the data set.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)38-49
Number of pages13
JournalR Journal
Volume14
Issue number4
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 1 Dec 2022

Keywords

  • SIGNAL EXTRACTION
  • ALGORITHM
  • PRECIPITATION
  • SELECTION
  • TRENDS

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