MIDAS Processor

A high-performance Rust tool for converting UK Met Office MIDAS weather datasets from BADC-CSV format to optimized Parquet files for efficient analysis.

Overview

MIDAS Processor is part of a climate research toolkit designed to process historical UK weather data from the CEDA Archive. It transforms the original BADC-CSV format into modern, optimized Parquet files with significant performance improvements for analytical workloads.

The MIDAS Ecosystem

This tool works as part of a complete climate data processing pipeline:

1. midas-fetcher: Downloads MIDAS datasets from CEDA
2. midas-processor (this tool): Converts BADC-CSV to optimized Parquet
3. Analysis tools: Python/R analysis of the resulting Parquet files

What is MIDAS?

MIDAS (Met Office Integrated Data Archive System) contains historical weather observations from 1000+ UK land-based weather stations, spanning from the late 19th century to present day. The datasets include:

• Daily rainfall observations (161k+ files, ~5GB)
• Daily temperature observations (41k+ files, ~2GB)
• Wind observations (12k+ files, ~9GB)
• Solar radiation observations (3k+ files, ~2GB)

Key Features

🚀 Performance Optimizations

• Large row groups (500K rows)
• Smart compression (Snappy, ZSTD, LZ4 options)
• Column statistics for query pruning
• Memory-efficient streaming for large datasets

🔍 Intelligent Processing

• Automatic dataset discovery from midas-fetcher cache
• Schema detection and validation

💻 User-Friendly Interface

• Interactive dataset selection when run without arguments
• Simple command-line interface with sensible defaults
• Comprehensive progress reporting with file counts and timing
• Verbose mode for debugging and optimization insights

Installation

Prerequisites

• Rust 1.70+ (uses Rust 2024 edition features)
• 8GB+ RAM recommended for large datasets

From Source

git clone https://github.com/your-org/midas-processor
cd midas-processor
cargo install --path .

From Crates.io

cargo install midas-processor

Usage

Quick Start

1. Download datasets using midas-fetcher
2. Convert with auto-discovery:

   midas-processor
   

   This will show available datasets and let you select one interactively.

Common Usage Patterns

# Interactive dataset selection
midas-processor

# Process specific dataset
midas-processor /path/to/uk-daily-rain-obs-202407

# Custom output location
midas-processor --output-path ./analysis/rain_data.parquet

# High compression for archival
midas-processor --compression zstd

# Schema analysis only (no conversion)
midas-processor --discovery-only --verbose

# Combine options
midas-processor /path/to/dataset --compression lz4 --verbose

Command-Line Options

Technical Details

Data Structure Optimizations

1. Station-Timestamp Sorting: Data is sorted by station_id then ob_end_time for optimal query performance
2. Large Row Groups: 500K rows per group for better compression and fewer metadata operations
3. Column Statistics: Enabled for all columns to allow query engines to skip irrelevant data
4. Memory Streaming: Processes datasets larger than available RAM through streaming execution

Quality Control

• Header validation: Ensures BADC-CSV headers are correctly parsed
• Schema consistency: Validates column structures across files
• Error reporting: Detailed error messages with file locations
• Missing data handling: Graceful handling of incomplete or corrupted files

Integration with Analysis Tools

Python (Polars)

import polars as pl

# Fast station-based query
df = pl.scan_parquet("rain_data.parquet") \
       .filter(pl.col("station_id") == "00009") \
       .collect()

# Time range analysis
monthly_avg = pl.scan_parquet("temperature_data.parquet") \
                .filter(pl.col("ob_end_time").dt.year() == 2023) \
                .group_by(["station_id", pl.col("ob_end_time").dt.month()]) \
                .agg(pl.col("air_temperature").mean()) \
                .collect()

Python (Pandas)

import pandas as pd

# Read with automatic optimization
df = pd.read_parquet("rain_data.parquet")

# Station-specific analysis
station_data = df[df['station_id'] == '00009']

R

library(arrow)

# Lazy evaluation with Arrow
rain_data <- open_dataset("rain_data.parquet")

# Efficient aggregation
monthly_totals <- rain_data %>%
  filter(year(ob_end_time) == 2023) %>%
  group_by(station_id, month = month(ob_end_time)) %>%
  summarise(total_rain = sum(prcp_amt, na.rm = TRUE)) %>%
  collect()

Troubleshooting

Common Issues

Memory Issues

# For very large datasets, ensure sufficient RAM or use streaming
midas --verbose  # Monitor memory usage

Performance Issues

# Check if storage is the bottleneck
midas --verbose  # Shows processing rates

Cache Directory Not Found

# Ensure midas-fetcher has been run first
ls ~/Library/Application\ Support/midas-fetcher/cache/  # macOS
ls ~/.config/midas-fetcher/cache/  # Linux

Error Messages

• "No MIDAS datasets found in cache": Run midas-fetcher first to download datasets
• "Failed to parse header": BADC-CSV file may be corrupted, check source data
• "Configuration file not found": Dataset type not recognized, check file structure

License

This project is licensed under the MIT License - see the LICENSE file for details.

Changelog

See CHANGELOG.md for detailed version history and release notes.

Contributing

We welcome contributions! Please see our contributing guidelines for details.

Development Setup

git clone https://github.com/your-org/midas-processor
cd midas-processor
cargo build
cargo test

Code Style

• Use cargo fmt for formatting
• Ensure cargo clippy passes without warnings
• Add tests for new functionality
• Update documentation for API changes

Citation

If you use this tool in your research, please cite:

@software{midas_processor,
  title = {MIDAS Processor: High-Performance Climate Data Processing},
  author = {Richard Lyon},
  year = {2025},
  url = {https://github.com/rjl-climate/midas_processor}
}

Support

• Documentation: See docs/ directory
• Issues: Report bugs via GitHub Issues
• Discussions: Ask questions in GitHub Discussions

Acknowledgments

• UK Met Office: For providing the MIDAS datasets
• CEDA: For hosting and maintaining the climate data archive
• BADC: For developing the CSV format standards
• Polars Project: For the high-performance DataFrame library enabling fast processing