# \[BUG?\] Escaping periods in vega-lite calculate transform **URL:** \ **Category:** Kibana\ **Created:** [July 10, 2018, 7:42pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/bug-escaping-periods-in-vega-lite-calculate-transform/139424 "2018-07-10T19:42:23Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![tadgh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/9f8e36/32.png) [@tadgh](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/tadgh)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2018, 7:42pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/bug-escaping-periods-in-vega-lite-calculate-transform/139424/1 "2018-07-10T19:42:23Z")
Using the percentile aggregate, elasticsearch returns results wherein the key contains a period. Like so: ``` "score_outlier": { "values": { "1.0": 1, "5.0": 1, "25.0": 2, "50.0": 3, "75.0": 3, "95.0": 5, "99.0": 5 } } ``` When visualizing, vega lite indicates that you should escape any fields containing periods using a double backslash: `\\`. This works totally fine in the encodings, like here: ``` { "mark": {"type": "bar", "style": "box"}, "encoding": { "y": {"field": "score_outlier.values.25\\.0", "type": "quantitative"}, "y2": {"field": "score_outlier.values.75\\.0", "type": "quantitative"}, "x": {"field": "key", "type": "nominal"}, "color": {"value": "steelblue"}, "size": {"value": 11} } } ``` But if I do the same thing during a `calculate` transform, I get a Parse Error from Vega. Here is an example which fails: ``` "transform": [ { "calculate": "datum.score_outlier.values.75\\.0 - datum.score_outlier.values.25\\.0", "as": "iqr" } ] ``` Which returns: `Expression parse error: "datum.score_outlier.values.75\\.0 - datum.score_outlier.values.25\\.0"` I've tried not escaping, double-escaping, using square bracket indexing, but nothing seems to work. Am I missing something? The moment I switch this calculation to use a field that doesn't contain a period, all is well. Thanks for any insights ---
**Author:** ![rashmi](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/rashmi/32/16391_2.png) [@rashmi](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/rashmi)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2018, 8:58pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/bug-escaping-periods-in-vega-lite-calculate-transform/139424/2 "2018-07-10T20:58:40Z")
@nyuriks - any thoughts here? ---
**Author:** ![tadgh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/9f8e36/32.png) [@tadgh](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/tadgh)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2018, 9:03pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/bug-escaping-periods-in-vega-lite-calculate-transform/139424/3 "2018-07-10T21:03:07Z")
To quick-fix the issue, I tried just adding a bucket script aggregation, which turns out, suffers the same issue I am seeing here I think. I actually think the issue may be higher up, in Elasticsearch: [Bucket Script Aggregating on fields that contain a period](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/bucket-script-aggregating-on-fields-that-contain-a-period/139428) . To narrow this down, I made a small example query. This may not be VEGA-related after all, but just ES related. ---
**Author:** ![nyuriks](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/nyuriks/32/26171_2.png) [@nyuriks](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/nyuriks)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2018, 9:19pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/bug-escaping-periods-in-vega-lite-calculate-transform/139424/4 "2018-07-10T21:19:29Z")
@tadgh for the Vega part, try using index access instead, e.g. `datum.score_outlier.values['75.0']` ---
**Author:** ![tadgh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/9f8e36/32.png) [@tadgh](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/tadgh)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2018, 10:19pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/bug-escaping-periods-in-vega-lite-calculate-transform/139424/5 "2018-07-10T22:19:14Z")
Thanks, changing my transform to: ``` "transform": [ { "calculate": "datum.score_outlier.values['75.0'] - datum.score_outlier.values['25.0']" "as": "iqr" }, ``` Did the trick. That said, seems a bit off that its fine in the encoding, but breaks in the calculation. Slightly unintuitive to have to nest quotes in one spot, but able to escape in another. ---
**Author:** ![nyuriks](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/nyuriks/32/26171_2.png) [@nyuriks](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/nyuriks)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2018, 12:46am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/bug-escaping-periods-in-vega-lite-calculate-transform/139424/6 "2018-07-11T00:46:35Z")
@tadgh while not ideal, the reason it works in the `field` is because `field` is not an expression, it is a path to a value inside the current `datum`. So if `datum` is `{a: {b: [10.5]: 'something'}}`, getting to `something` would be `a.b.10\\.5`. On the other hand, `signal` and `expr` values are real expressions - they get evaluated similar to how javascript evaluates things. JS would throw an error with `datum.a.b.10\\.5`, and so does Vega. ---
**Author:** ![tadgh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/9f8e36/32.png) [@tadgh](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/tadgh)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2018, 3:07am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/bug-escaping-periods-in-vega-lite-calculate-transform/139424/7 "2018-07-11T03:07:11Z")
Understood, thanks for the clarification ---
**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/original/3X/1/a/1ac57faf039f6b580b3f104ef42a2a89e41014de.png) [@system](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/system)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2018, 3:07am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/bug-escaping-periods-in-vega-lite-calculate-transform/139424/8 "2018-08-08T03:07:16Z")
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