Methods and devices for simplifying data collected from assets are provided. An example method involves obtaining raw data from a data source at an asset, determining that a data logging trigger is satisfied by determining that a recently obtained point in the raw data differs from a corresponding predicted point predicted by extrapolation based on previously saved points included in one or more previously generated simplified sets of data by an amount of extrapolation error that is limited by an upper bound that is fixed as the raw data is collected over time, and, when the data logging trigger is satisfied, performing a dataset simplification algorithm on the raw data to generate a simplified set of data.