Add discussion of patching functionality to indicator manual

.github/CONTRIBUTING.md

@@ -12,7 +12,9 @@ The production branch is configured to automatically deploy to our production en
 
 * everything else
 
-All other branches are development branches. We don't enforce a naming policy.
+All other branches are development branches. We don't enforce a naming policy, but it is recommended to prefix all branches you create with your name, username, or initials (e.g. `username/branch-name`).
+
+We don't forbid force-pushing, but please keep to a minimum and be careful of using when modifying a branch at the same time as others.
 
 ## Issues
 
@@ -29,7 +31,7 @@ So, how does one go about developing a pipeline for a new data source?
 ### tl;dr
 
 1. Create your new indicator branch from `main`.
-2. Build it using the appropriate template, following the guidelines in the included README.md and REVIEW.md files.
+2. Build it using the [indicator template](https://github.com/cmu-delphi/covidcast-indicators/tree/main/_template_python), following the guidelines in the included README.md, REVIEW.md, and INDICATOR_DEV_GUIDE.md files.
 3. Make some stuff!
 4. When your stuff works, push your development branch to remote, and open a PR against `main` for review.
 5. Once your PR has been merged, consult with a platform engineer for the remaining production setup needs. They will create a deployment workflow for your indicator including any necessary production parameters. Production secrets are encrypted in the Ansible vault. This workflow will be tested in staging by admins, who will consult you about any problems they encounter.
@@ -50,7 +52,7 @@ git checkout -b dev-my-feature-branch
 
 ### Creating your indicator
 
-Create a directory for your new indicator by making a copy of `_template_r` or `_template_python` depending on the programming language you intend to use. If using Python, add the name of the directory to the list found in `jobs > build > strategy > matrix > packages` in `.github/workflows/python-ci.yml`, which will enable automated checks for your indicator when you make PRs. The template copies of `README.md` and `REVIEW.md` include the minimum requirements for code structure, documentation, linting, testing, and method of configuration. Beyond that, we don't have any established restrictions on implementation; you can look at other existing indicators see some examples of code layout, organization, and general approach.
+Create a directory for your new indicator by making a copy of `_template_python`. (We also make a `_template_r` available, but R should be only used as a last resort, due to complications using it in production.) Add the name of the directory to the list found in `jobs > build > strategy > matrix > packages` in `.github/workflows/python-ci.yml`, which will enable automated checks for your indicator when you make PRs. The template copies of `README.md` and `REVIEW.md` include the minimum requirements for code structure, documentation, linting, testing, and method of configuration. Beyond that, we don't have any established restrictions on implementation; you can look at other existing indicators see some examples of code layout, organization, and general approach.
 
 * Consult your peers with questions! :handshake:
 
@@ -62,7 +64,7 @@ Once you have something that runs locally and passes tests you set up your remot
 git push -u origin dev-my-feature-branch
 ```
 
-You can then draft public API documentation for people who would fetch this
+You can then draft [public API documentation](https://cmu-delphi.github.io/delphi-epidata/) for people who would fetch this
 data from the API. Public API documentation is kept in the delphi-epidata
 repository, and there is a [template Markdown
 file](https://github.com/cmu-delphi/delphi-epidata/blob/main/docs/api/covidcast-signals/_source-template.md)
@@ -104,7 +106,8 @@ We use a branch-based git workflow coupled with [Jenkins](https://www.jenkins.io
   * Package - Tar and gzip the built environment.
   * Deploy - Trigger an Ansible playbook to place the built package onto the runtime host, place any necessary production configuration, and adjust the runtime envirnemnt (if necessary).
 
-There are several additional Jenkins-specific files that will need to be created for each indicator, as well as some configuration additions to the runtime host. It will be important to pair with a platform engineer to prepare the necessary production environment needs, test the workflow, validate on production, and ultimately sign off on a production release.
+There are several additional Jenkins-specific files that will need to be created for each indicator, as well as some configuration additions to the runtime host.
+It will be important to pair with a platform engineer to prepare the necessary production environment needs, test the workflow, validate on production, and ultimately sign off on a production release.
 
 ### Preparing container images of indicators
 

_template_python/INDICATOR_DEV_GUIDE.md

@@ -50,6 +50,7 @@ This is the general extract-transform-load procedure used by all COVIDcast indic
 7. Deliver the CSV output files to the `receiving/` directory on the API server.
 
 Adding a new indicator typically means implementing steps 1-3. Step 4 is included via the function ` create_export_csv`. Steps 5 (the validator), 6 (the archive differ) and 7 (acquisition) are all handled by runners in production.
+
 ## Step 0: Keep revision history (important!)
 
 If the data provider doesn’t provide or it is unclear if they provide historical versions of the data, immediately set up a script (bash, Python, etc) to automatically (e.g. cron) download the data every day and save locally with versioning.
@@ -195,7 +196,14 @@ Generally, indicators have:
   Do other geo handling (e.g. finding and reporting DC as a state).
 * `constants.py`: Lists of geos to produce, signals to produce, dataset ids, data source URL, etc.
 
-Your code should be _extensively_ commented! Especially note sections where you took an unusual approach (make sure to say why and consider briefly discussing alternate approaches).
+Your code should be _extensively_ commented! Especially note sections where you took an unusual approach (make sure to say why and consider briefly discussing alternate approaches that were discarded or could be useful in the future).
+
+#### Development environment
+
+Make sure you have a functional environment with python 3.8.15+.
+For local runs, the makefile’s make install target will set up a local virtual environment with necessary packages.
+
+(If working in R (very much NOT recommended), local runs can be run without a virtual environment or using the [`renv` package](https://rstudio.github.io/renv/articles/renv.html), but production runs should be set up to use Docker.)
 
 #### Function stubs
 
@@ -235,12 +243,22 @@ def api_call(token: str):
 
 After that, generalize your code to be able to be run on all geos of interest, take settings from params.json, use constants for easy maintenance, with extensive documentation, etc.
 
-#### Development environment
+#### Testing
 
-Make sure you have a functional environment with python 3.8.15+.
-For local runs, the makefile’s make install target will set up a local virtual environment with necessary packages.
+As a general rule, it helps to decompose your functions into operations for which you can write unit tests.
+To run the tests, use `make test` in the top-level indicator directory.
 
-(If working in R (very much NOT recommended), local runs can be run without a virtual environment or using the [`renv` package](https://rstudio.github.io/renv/articles/renv.html), but production runs should be set up to use Docker.)
+Unit tests are required for all functions.
+Integration tests are highly desired, but may be difficult to set up depending on where the data is being fetched from.
+Mocking functions are useful in this case.
+
+#### Dealing with dates
+
+We keep track of two different date fields for each dataset. The first field is called "reference value" (field name `time_value`) and tracks the date that a value is reported _for_, that is, when the event happened. The second field is called "issue date" or "version" (field name `issue`) and tracks when a value was recorded, not when it happened.
+
+For example, flu test positivity of 80% for a reference date of Jan 1 and an issue date of Jan 5 means that _on_ Jan 1, the test positivity rate was 80%. But we only received and recorded the value on Jan 5, 4 days later (AKA a lag of 4 days).
+
+It's important to track issue date because many data sources are revised over time, and reported values can change substantially between issues.
 
 #### Dealing with data-types
 
@@ -255,14 +273,16 @@ E.g. which geo values are allowed, should every valid date be present in some wa
 
 In an ideal case, the data exists at one of our [already covered geos](https://cmu-delphi.github.io/delphi-epidata/api/covidcast_geography.html):
 
-* State: state_code (string, leftpadded to 2 digits with 0) or state_id (string)
+* Zip code
 * FIPS (state+county codes, string leftpadded to 5 digits with 0)
-* ZIP
 * MSA (metro statistical area, int)
 * HRR (hospital referral region, int)
+* State: state_code (string, leftpadded to 2 digits with 0) or state_id (string)
+* HHS ([Department of Health and Human Services-defined regions](https://www.hhs.gov/about/agencies/iea/regional-offices/index.html))
+* Nation
 
-If you want to map from one of these to another, the [`delphi_utils.geomapper`](https://github.com/cmu-delphi/covidcast-indicators/blob/6912077acba97e835aff7d0cd3d64309a1a9241d/_delphi_utils_python/delphi_utils/geomap.py) utility covers most cases.
-A brief example of aggregating from states to hhs regions via their population:
+If you want to map from one of these to a higher level, the [`delphi_utils.geomapper`](https://github.com/cmu-delphi/covidcast-indicators/blob/6912077acba97e835aff7d0cd3d64309a1a9241d/_delphi_utils_python/delphi_utils/geomap.py) utility covers most cases.
+Here's a brief example of aggregating from states to hhs regions via their population:
 
 ```{python}
 from delphi_utils.geomap import GeoMapper
@@ -274,19 +294,6 @@ hhs_version = geo_mapper.replace_geocode(df, "state_code","hhs", new_col = "geo_
 
 This example is taken from [`hhs_hosp`](https://github.com/cmu-delphi/covidcast-indicators/blob/main/hhs_hosp/delphi_hhs/run.py); more documentation can be found in the `geomapper` class definition.
 
-#### Implement a Missing Value code system
-
-The column is described [here](https://cmu-delphi.github.io/delphi-epidata/api/missing_codes.html).
-
-#### Local testing
-
-As a general rule, it helps to decompose your functions into operations for which you can write unit tests.
-To run the tests, use `make test` in the top-level indicator directory.
-
-Unit tests are required for all functions.
-Integration tests are highly desired, but may be difficult to set up depending on where the data is being fetched from.
-Mocking functions are useful in this case.
-
 #### Naming
 
 Indicator and signal names need to be approved by [@RoniRos](https://www.github.com/RoniRos).
@@ -324,6 +331,52 @@ Using this tag dictionary, we can interpret the following signals as
 * `confirmed_admissions_influenza_1d_prop` = raw (unsmoothed) daily ("1d") confirmed influenza hospital admissions ("confirmed_admissions_influenza") per 100,000 population ("prop").
 * `confirmed_admissions_influenza_1d_prop_7dav` = the same as above, but smoothed with a 7-day moving average ("7dav").
 
+#### Implement a Missing Value code system
+
+The column is described [here](https://cmu-delphi.github.io/delphi-epidata/api/missing_codes.html).
+
+#### Implement a patching method
+
+After normal data reporting is restored following an outage, we would like to be able to easily reconstruct the version history of the data. To do so, implement a `patch` method that runs an indicator's main `run_module` for every issue date in a range. An [example patch module](https://github.com/cmu-delphi/covidcast-indicators/blob/b784f30/google_symptoms/delphi_google_symptoms/patch.py).
+
+An outage can be external to Delphi, e.g. the data provider was unable to provide new data on the historically-expected schedule, or internal, e.g. Delphi code had a bug that caused our pipeline to fail. The goal of the patch feature is to recreate every missing issue _as if we had ingested it on the correct day_.
+
+The patch feature should be easy to use. The only manual parts should be modifying `params.json`, and running the patch module and acquisition. Any setup that needs to be done (e.g. cache creation, dir creation) should be done automatically as part of the patch function.
+
+All patch modules should expect settings from `params.json` of the form
+
+```
+{
+  "common": {
+    ...
+    "custom_run": true
+  },
+  "validation": {
+    ...
+  },
+  "patch": {
+    "patch_dir": "<path to dir>/<patch dir name>",
+    "start_issue": "2024-04-20",
+    "end_issue": "2024-04-21"
+  }
+}
+```
+
+The `custom_run` parameter should [default to false](https://github.com/cmu-delphi/covidcast-indicators/blob/d435bf0f0d5880ddf8905ea60f242976e6702342/nssp/delphi_nssp/run.py#L73), and [warn](https://github.com/cmu-delphi/covidcast-indicators/blob/d435bf0f0d5880ddf8905ea60f242976e6702342/nssp/delphi_nssp/run.py#L75-L83) if parameters and arguments disagree.
+
+Patching should generate data for that range of issue dates, and store them in batch issue format:
+`<patch_dir as provided in the params>/issue_<issue date>/<indicator name as stored in our DB>/xxx.csv`.
+
+Acquisition in `delphi-epidata` includes [code that allow files in this issue-specific structure](https://github.com/cmu-delphi/delphi-epidata/blob/694d89ad763fa85bd644e1f64552c9bc85f688ef/src/acquisition/covidcast/csv_to_database.py#L43C32-L43C61) to be added to the database. This output format is designed to match the `issue`-type acquisition format. The issue-specific mode is triggered with the flag `specific_issue_date`. [A Cronicle job](https://cronicle-prod-01.delphi.cmu.edu/#Schedule?sub=edit_event&id=elh59ynwobf) has already been set up to call acquisition using the flag; please use it to load patches into the database.
+
+Sometimes source data is already versioned, and to reconstruct an issue we simply need to filter the source data to include only values that would have been available on that issue day. If we receive data drops directly, we can filter by the file creation date instead.
+
+However, it is not always possible to reconstruct issues; many datasets aren't versioned by the provider. If a source has no revisions (for example, `google-symptoms`), then we can guess which dates of data would have been available that issue day based on the normal lag of the source. For example, `google-symptoms` normally has a lag of 4 days, i.e. "today" the most recent data we see in the source data is from 4 days ago. So to reconstruct data for issue 2024-01-10, we just need to report data with a `time_value` (reference date) from 2024-01-06 and earlier. (How much earlier depends on the behavior we normally expect from the indicator code; if we normally report 2 weeks of data, filter to 2024-01-06 - 14 days through 2024-01-06.)
+
+Some datasets, such as those on healthdata.gov, provide metadata indicating when certain rows were updated.
+
+In other cases (such as datasetes that both have revisions _and_ don't track revisions), please discuss with the indicator stakeholder and consider [what you know about how the data works](#step-1-exploratory-analysis).
+
 ### Statistical review
 
 The data produced by the new indicator needs to be sanity-checked.
@@ -419,14 +472,17 @@ Refer to [this guide](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Bbuvtoxowt7x2_8USx_JY-
 
 * Add module name to the `build` job in `.github/workflows/python-ci.yml`.
   This allows github actions to run on this indicator code, which includes unit tests and linting.
-* Add top-level directory name to `indicator_list` in `Jenkinsfile`.
+* Add module name to the ["Copy version to indicator directory" step](https://github.com/cmu-delphi/covidcast-indicators/blob/f01185767a9847d8082baf4f1e17be50a39047c2/.github/workflows/create-release.yml#L64) in `.github/workflows/create-release.yml`.
+* Add top-level directory name to [`indicator_list` in `Jenkinsfile`](https://github.com/cmu-delphi/covidcast-indicators/blob/f01185767a9847d8082baf4f1e17be50a39047c2/Jenkinsfile#L13).
   This allows your code to be automatically deployed to staging after your branch is merged to main, and deployed to prod after `covidcast-indicators` is released.
 * Create `ansible/templates/{top_level_directory_name}-params-prod.json.j2` based on your `params.json.template` with some adjustment:
    * "export_dir": "/common/covidcast/receiving/{data-source-name}"
    * "log_filename": "/var/log/indicators/{top_level_directory_name}.log"
+* Define any sensitive variables as "secrets" in the [Ansible `vars.yaml`](https://github.com/cmu-delphi/covidcast-indicators/blob/main/ansible/vars.yaml) and [vault](https://github.com/cmu-delphi/covidcast-indicators/blob/main/ansible/vault.yaml).
+Refer to [this guide](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Bbuvtoxowt7x2_8USx_JY-yTo-Av3oAFlhyG-vXGG-c/edit#heading=h.8kkoy8sx3t7f) for more vault info.
+* Add configs for Sir Complains-a-Lot ("sirCAL") alerting in sirCAL's [local](https://github.com/cmu-delphi/covidcast-indicators/blob/main/sir_complainsalot/params.json.template) and [Ansible](https://github.com/cmu-delphi/covidcast-indicators/blob/main/ansible/templates/sir_complainsalot-params-prod.json.j2) params templates.
 
 Pay attention to the receiving/export directory, as well as how you can store credentials in vault.
-Refer to [this guide](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Bbuvtoxowt7x2_8USx_JY-yTo-Av3oAFlhyG-vXGG-c/edit#heading=h.8kkoy8sx3t7f) for more vault info.
 
 ### Staging