Grouping data by quarter intervals (or any time interval) with a defined starting basis in postgresql - postgresql

Question

Let's say I have a table orders with columns amount and order_date.
I want to be able to group this data by quarters and aggregate the amount, the catch however is that the quarters do not start on January 1st but on any given arbitrary date, say July 12th. These quarters are also split in 13 week intervals. From what I see using something like date_trunc such as:
SELECT SUM(orders.amount), DATE_TRUNC('quarter', orders.order_date) AS interval FROM orders WHERE orders.order_date BETWEEN [date_start] AND [date_end] GROUP BY interval
is out of the question as this forces quarters to start on Jan 1st and it has 'hardcoded' quarter starting dates (Apr 1st, Jul 1st, etc).
I have tried using something like:
SELECT SUM(orders.amount),
to_timestamp(floor((extract('epoch' from orders.order_date / 7862400 )) * 7862400 ) AT TIME ZONE 'UTC' AS interval
FROM orders
WHERE orders.order_date BETWEEN [date_start] AND [date_end]
GROUP BY interval
(where 7862400 is the time interval that I want)
But with this method I cannot figure out how to set the offset for the initial grouping date, in my example I would like it to start from July 12th of each year (then count 13 weeks and start the next quarter, and so on). Hope I was clear and I would appreciate any help!

Answer 1

You can use generate_series() to create the first day of each quarter, join it and group by it.
SELECT quarters.first_day,
quarters.first_day + '13 weeks'::interval last_day,
sum(orders.amount) amount
FROM orders
LEFT JOIN generate_series('2019-07-12'::timestamp,
'2020-07-10'::timestamp,
'13 weeks'::interval) quarters (first_day)
ON quarters.first_day <= orders.order_date
AND quarters.first_day + '13 weeks'::interval > orders.order_date
WHERE orders.order_date BETWEEN [date_start]
AND [date_end]
GROUP BY quarters.first_day,
quarters.first_day + '13 weeks'::interval;
You just need to make sure, that the boundary days you give the generate_series() cover the whole period you want to query, so that depends on your [date_start] and [date_end].

Answer 2

You can generate your own 'quarterly calendar' and use that in place of the Postgers 'quarter' date extraction.
create or replace function quarterly_calendar(annual_date text default extract('YEAR' from current_date)::text)
returns table( quarter integer
, quarter_start_date date
, quarter_end_date date
)
language sql immutable strict leakproof
as $$
with RECURSIVE quarters as
(select 1 qtr, qdt::date q_start_dt, (qdt + interval '90 day' )::date q_end_dt, (qdt+interval '1 year' - interval '1 day')::date last_dt
from ( select date_trunc('year',current_date) + interval '6 month 11 day' qdt) q
union all
select qtr+1, (q_end_dt + interval '1 day')::date, least ((q_end_dt + interval '91 day')::date,last_dt), last_dt
from quarters
where qtr+1 <=5
)
select qtr, q_start_dt, q_end_dt
from quarters;
$$;
-- test
select * from quarterly_calender();
It does actually create 5 quarters. But that is because a year is not a multiple of 13 weeks (or 91 days or 7862400 seconds). In your given year from 12-July-2019 through 11-July-2020 is 2 days (366 days total) over 4 times that interval. You'll have to decide how to handle that 5th quarter. It occurs every year, having either 1 or 2 days. Hope this helps .