calculate different between consecutive date records at an ID level - python-3.x

Question

I have a dataframe as
col 1 col 2
A 2020-07-13
A 2020-07-15
A 2020-07-18
A 2020-07-19
B 2020-07-13
B 2020-07-19
C 2020-07-13
C 2020-07-18
I want it to become the following in a new dataframe
col_3 diff_btw_1st_2nd_date diff_btw_2nd_3rd_date diff_btw_3rd_4th_date
A 2 3 1
B 6 NaN NaN
C 5 NaN NaN
I tried getting the groupby at Col 1 level , but not getting the intended result. Can anyone help?

Answer 1

Use GroupBy.cumcount for counter pre column col 1 and reshape by DataFrame.set_index with Series.unstack, then use DataFrame.diff, remove first only NaNs columns by DataFrame.iloc, convert timedeltas to days by Series.dt.days per all columns and change columns names by DataFrame.add_prefix:
df['col 2'] = pd.to_datetime(df['col 2'])
df = (df.set_index(['col 1',df.groupby('col 1').cumcount()])['col 2']
.unstack()
.diff(axis=1)
.iloc[:, 1:]
.apply(lambda x: x.dt.days)
.add_prefix('diff_')
.reset_index())
print (df)
col 1 diff_1 diff_2 diff_3
0 A 2 3.0 1.0
1 B 6 NaN NaN
2 C 5 NaN NaN
Or use DataFrameGroupBy.diff with counter for new columns by DataFrame.assign, reshape by DataFrame.pivot and remove NaNs by c2 with DataFrame.dropna:
df['col 2'] = pd.to_datetime(df['col 2'])
df = (df.assign(g = df.groupby('col 1').cumcount(),
c1 = df.groupby('col 1')['col 2'].diff().dt.days)
.dropna(subset=['c1'])
.pivot('col 1','g','c1')
.add_prefix('diff_')
.rename_axis(None, axis=1)
.reset_index())
print (df)
col 1 diff_1 diff_2 diff_3
0 A 2.0 3.0 1.0
1 B 6.0 NaN NaN
2 C 5.0 NaN NaN

Answer 2

You can assign a cumcount number grouped by col 1, and pivot the table using that cumcount number.
Solution
df["col 2"] = pd.to_datetime(df["col 2"])
# 1. compute date difference in days using diff() and dt accessor
df["diff"] = df.groupby(["col 1"])["col 2"].diff().dt.days
# 2. assign cumcount for pivoting
df["cumcount"] = df.groupby("col 1").cumcount()
# 3. partial transpose, discarding the first difference in nan
df2 = df[["col 1", "diff", "cumcount"]]\
.pivot(index="col 1", columns="cumcount")\
.drop(columns=[("diff", 0)])
Result
# replace column names for readability
df2.columns = [f"d{i+2}-d{i+1}" for i in range(len(df2.columns))]
print(df2)
d2-d1 d3-d2 d4-d3
col 1
A 2.0 3.0 1.0
B 6.0 NaN NaN
C 5.0 NaN NaN
df after assing cumcount is like this
print(df)
col 1 col 2 diff cumcount
0 A 2020-07-13 NaN 0
1 A 2020-07-15 2.0 1
2 A 2020-07-18 3.0 2
3 A 2020-07-19 1.0 3
4 B 2020-07-13 NaN 0
5 B 2020-07-19 6.0 1
6 C 2020-07-13 NaN 0
7 C 2020-07-18 5.0 1