Publications by David Smith
Ross Ihaka on the history of the R project
Ross Ihaka, one of the co-creators of R (along with Robert Gentleman), recently gave an interview to the University of Auckland's alumni magazine, Ingenio. In the article, he shares the story of the genesis of R in the early 1990s: The story all began back in the early 1990s when the internet was in its infancy and computers at the University of...
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In case you missed it: May 2016 roundup
In case you missed them, here are some articles from May of particular interest to R users. A 3-part tutorial on principal components regression in R: part 1, part 2, and part 3. Implications of the fact that in R, names have objects (and not vice-versa). Highlights of the R/Finance 2016 conference, according to Joseph Rickert. A template ...
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Interactive maps and charts in R
Randy George, an expert in web map applications, has been fascinated with computer graphics (especially maps) since the early '80s. For much of that time, he says, the technology for mapping has been pretty static: The main stay of web mapping applications for the last couple of decades has been three tier: Model – SQL, View – web UI, and C...
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R holds top ranking in KDnuggets software poll
The open-source R language is the most frequently used analytics / data science software, selected by 49% of the 2895 voters of the 2016 KDNuggets Software Poll. (R was also the top selection in last year's poll.) Python was a close second at 45.8%, and SQL was third at 35.5%. (Respondents could select multiple tools in the poll, and 6 tools ...
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Gender ratios of programmers, by language
While there are many admirable efforts to increase participation by women in STEM fields, in many programming teams men still outnumber women, often by a significant margin. Specifically by how much is a fraught question, and accurate statistics are hard to come by. Another interesting question is whether the gender disparity varies by language, ...
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Data Journalism Awards Data Visualization of the Year, 2016
Congratulations to Peter Aldhous and Charles Seife of Buzzfeed News, winners of the 2016 Data Journalism Award for Data Visualization of the Year. They were recognized by their reporting for Spies in the Sky, which analyzed FAA air traffic records to visulize the domestic surveillance activities of the US government. Aldhouse and Seife used the...
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Updates to the ‘forecast’ package for R
The forecast package for R, created and maintained by Professor Rob Hyndman of Monash University, is one of the more useful R packages available available on CRAN. Statistical forecasting — the process of predicting the future value of a time series — is used in just about every realm of data analysis, whether it's trying to predict a future ...
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R 3.3.1 now available
Peter Dalgaard announced yesterday on behalf of the R core team that R 3.3.1, the latest update to the R language, is now available for download from your local CRAN mirror. As of this writing, binaries of R 3.3.1 are available for Windows and Linux; the Mac version should appear very soon. This minor update, codenamed “Bug in Your Hair”, ma...
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Amazon X-ray data provides insight into movie characters
I'm a regular user of Amazon Video: as someone who spends a fair bit of time on planes, it's great to be able to download some of my favourite shows (hello, Orphan Black and Vikings) and catch up on episodes during the trip. Amazon Video has a useful feature, too: if you forget the name of a character, or if you see an an actor and wonder what ot...
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Livestreaming of useR! 2016 conference begins tomorrow, June 28
The useR! 2016 conference, the annual gathering of R users from around the world, is already underway at Stanford University. Today is a day of interactive tutorials, and the presentation program begins tomorrow. But don't worry if you weren't able to make it to California, or if you missed out on getting a ticket for the conference. (You're not ...
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