> For the complete documentation index, see [llms.txt](https://docs.bdb.ai/feature-list/llms.txt). Markdown versions of documentation pages are available by appending `.md` to page URLs; this page is available as [Markdown](https://docs.bdb.ai/feature-list/8.x/team-feature/data-science-lab/auto-forecasting-requirements/user-input.md).

# User Input

Input required form Users:

* Target column
* Date Column
* Forecast Horizon
* Static features :  The time-independent attributes (metadata) of a time series. These may include information such as:
  * location, where the time series was recorded (country, state, city)
  * fixed properties of a product (brand name, color, size, weight)
  * store ID or product ID
* Known Covariates :  are known for the entire forecast horizon, such as
  * holidays
  * day of the week, month, year
  * promotions
* Past Covariates : are only known up to the start of the forecast horizon, such as
  * sales of other products
  * temperature, precipitation
  * transformed target time series
* Handling Missing Data : 
  * Completely ignore the time index
  * Extend the index and fill missing values

>


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