Specify mitigation scenarios as intervals

In some situations, it might be more convenient to specify the mitigation scenarios as time intervals:

--2020-03-01                    100%
2020-03-01 -- 2020-03-15         50%
2020-03-16 -- 2020-03-31         75%
2020-04-01 -- 2020-05-31         60%
2020-06-01 --                    50%

The data structure for this would work just about the same way as a time series of adjacent intervals, the main difference would be UI. Need to think about how to enforce that intervals tile time.

[ivan-aksamentov]

I was thinking about making the containment (mitigation) plot into a sort of a bar chart:

• bar width corresponds to the time interval
• bar height is the value
• click on the bar (or on its continuation above the upper edge of it) adjusts the value
• optionally, click and drag will display the date and the value being adjusted, for better UX
• this would work for any time-aware parameter.
• intervals can be non-uniform
• interval can be set by the user
• changing global start and end dates adds or removes the bars on the sides
• optionally, when global dates were shrinked, and then expanded back, plot would remember the values lost on the sides and restore them

Additionally, we can represent the same data as a table. We could either display both or to add a toggle.

[rneher]

Here is another proposal to improve the specification of mitigation and infection control measures.

2020-03-01 -- 2020-04-15   schools closed        -10%
2020-03-15 -- 2020-05-31   bars, restaurants     -10%
2020-04-01 -- 2020-05-31   lock-down             -20%

One could have a date range selector and then include these as horizontal bars in the result plot. More measures could be added with an ‘add’ button (similar to filters in search interfaces). This would then translate into a time series with a few vertical steps. But the general logic of a linearly interpolated function would still hold, so this would require few changes in the algorithm.

The constraint that the combined measures can’t be more than 100% is most readily addressed by making these effects multiplicative (Effects of -10%, -20%, -15% would then combine to 0.90.80.85)

@rodolfoalmeida01 and @arieltonglet, if this is something you’d be keen on, let me know. Happy to touch base.