Once you have collected your time series data, you will need to define the header information. The required header information includes the following.
Variable name. The name by which the program refers to an individual item (often an SKU). An item name is limited to 256 of the following characters:
0-9 A-Z a-z ! # $ % & ? @ _ + - / * . ~ < >
However, you may also be limited by restrictions imposed by the software to which you export your data. SQL databases, for instance, sometimes require that the first character in a name is a letter and do not regard upper and lower cases as distinct.
Variable description. A short description of the variable. Variable descriptions must not exceed 256 characters in length. Variable descriptions are displayed within Forecast Pro and can be included in Numeric Output Files and Formatted Forecast Report Files.
Starting year. The year and period corresponding to the first available data point. If the first available observation for a monthly series was April 2016, then the starting year would be 2016 and the starting period would be 4. The starting year must be 100 or later. For data that are not calendar-oriented, enter 100 for the starting year and 1 for the starting period.
Periods per year. 12 for monthly data, 4 for quarterly data, etc. For data that is not calendar oriented, use 1. Note that most weekly corporate calendars involve occasional years of 53 weeks—these occurrences will cause the forecast date tags to be off by a week.
Periods per cycle. The number of periods per seasonal cycle, usually equal to the number of periods per year. An exception might be daily data, where periods per cycle could be set to 7 to capture weekly patterns and periods per year set to 365. Or, if weekend days are excluded, periods per cycle might be 5 and periods per year 260. For nonseasonal data, periods per cycle should be 1. This is a critical entry because Forecast Pro uses it for seasonal adjustments.