Authors Drew Conway and John Myles White help you understand machine learning and statistics tools through a series of hands-on case studies, instead of a traditional math-heavy presentation.Each chapter focuses on a specific problem in machine learning, such as classification, prediction, optimization, and recommendation. Using the R programming language, you'll learn how to analyze sample datasets and write simple machine learning algorithms. "Machine Learning for Hackers" is ideal for programmers from any background, including business, government, and academic research.Develop a naive Bayesian classifier to determine if an email is spam, based only on its textUse linear regression to predict the number of page views for the top 1,000 websitesLearn optimization techniques by attempting to break a simple letter cipherCompare and contrast U.S. Senators statistically, based on their voting recordsBuild a "whom to follow" recommendation system from Twitter data

    Five years ago, in What is Web 2.0, Tim O'Reilly said that "data is the next Intel Inside." But what does that statement mean? Why do we suddenly care about statistics and about data? This report examines the many sides of data science -- the technologies, the companies and the unique skill sets.The web is full of "data-driven apps." Almost any e-commerce application is a data-driven application. There's a database behind a web front end, and middleware that talks to a number of other databases and data services (credit card processing companies, banks, and so on). But merely using data isn't really what we mean by "data science." A data application acquires its value from the data itself, and creates more data as a result. It's not just an application with data; it's a data product. Data science enables the creation of data products.

    Wouldn't it be wonderful if we could actually visualize data in such a way that we could maximize its potential and tell a story in a clear, concise manner? Thanks to the creative genius of Nathan Yau, we can. With this full-color book, data visualization guru and author Nathan Yau uses step-by-step tutorials to show you how to visualize and tell stories with data. He explains how to gather, parse, and format data and then design high quality graphics that help you explore and present patterns, outliers, and relationships.Presents a unique approach to visualizing and telling stories with data, from a data visualization expert and the creator of flowingdata.com, Nathan Yau Offers step-by-step tutorials and practical design tips for creating statistical graphics, geographical maps, and information design to find meaning in the numbers Details tools that can be used to visualize data-native graphics for the Web, such as ActionScript, Flash libraries, PHP, and JavaScript and tools to design graphics for print, such as R and Illustrator Contains numerous examples and descriptions of patterns and outliers and explains how to show them Visualize This demonstrates how to explain data visually so that you can present your information in a way that is easy to understand and appealing.

    How can we catch schools that cheat on standardized tests? How does Netflix know which movies you’ll like? What is causing the rising incidence of autism? As best-selling author Charles Wheelan shows us in Naked Statistics, the right data and a few well-chosen statistical tools can help us answer these questions and more.For those who slept through Stats 101, this book is a lifesaver. Wheelan strips away the arcane and technical details and focuses on the underlying intuition that drives statistical analysis. He clarifies key concepts such as inference, correlation, and regression analysis, reveals how biased or careless parties can manipulate or misrepresent data, and shows us how brilliant and creative researchers are exploiting the valuable data from natural experiments to tackle thorny questions.And in Wheelan’s trademark style, there’s not a dull page in sight. You’ll encounter clever Schlitz Beer marketers leveraging basic probability, an International Sausage Festival illuminating the tenets of the central limit theorem, and a head-scratching choice from the famous game show Let’s Make a Deal—and you’ll come away with insights each time. With the wit, accessibility, and sheer fun that turned Naked Economics into a bestseller, Wheelan defies the odds yet again by bringing another essential, formerly unglamorous discipline to life.

    However, most discussions of Bayesian inference rely on intensely complex mathematical analyses and artificial examples, making it inaccessible to anyone without a strong mathematical background. Now, though, Cameron Davidson-Pilon introduces Bayesian inference from a computational perspective, bridging theory to practice-freeing you to get results using computing power. Bayesian Methods for Hackers illuminates Bayesian inference through probabilistic programming with the powerful PyMC language and the closely related Python tools NumPy, SciPy, and Matplotlib. Using this approach, you can reach effective solutions in small increments, without extensive mathematical intervention. Davidson-Pilon begins by introducing the concepts underlying Bayesian inference, comparing it with other techniques and guiding you through building and training your first Bayesian model. Next, he introduces PyMC through a series of detailed examples and intuitive explanations that have been refined after extensive user feedback. You'll learn how to use the Markov Chain Monte Carlo algorithm, choose appropriate sample sizes and priors, work with loss functions, and apply Bayesian inference in domains ranging from finance to marketing. Once you've mastered these techniques, you'll constantly turn to this guide for the working PyMC code you need to jumpstart future projects. Coverage includes - Learning the Bayesian "state of mind" and its practical implications - Understanding how computers perform Bayesian inference - Using the PyMC Python library to program Bayesian analyses - Building and debugging models with PyMC - Testing your model's "goodness of fit" - Opening the "black box" of the Markov Chain Monte Carlo algorithm to see how and why it works - Leveraging the power of the "Law of Large Numbers" - Mastering key concepts, such as clustering, convergence, autocorrelation, and thinning - Using loss functions to measure an estimate's weaknesses based on your goals and desired outcomes - Selecting appropriate priors and understanding how their influence changes with dataset size - Overcoming the "exploration versus exploitation" dilemma: deciding when "pretty good" is good enough - Using Bayesian inference to improve A/B testing - Solving data science problems when only small amounts of data are available Cameron Davidson-Pilon has worked in many areas of applied mathematics, from the evolutionary dynamics of genes and diseases to stochastic modeling of financial prices. His contributions to the open source community include lifelines, an implementation of survival analysis in Python. Educated at the University of Waterloo and at the Independent University of Moscow, he currently works with the online commerce leader Shopify.

    With the sophisticated algorithms in this book, you can write smart programs to access interesting datasets from other web sites, collect data from users of your own applications, and analyze and understand the data once you've found it.Programming Collective Intelligence takes you into the world of machine learning and statistics, and explains how to draw conclusions about user experience, marketing, personal tastes, and human behavior in general -- all from information that you and others collect every day. Each algorithm is described clearly and concisely with code that can immediately be used on your web site, blog, Wiki, or specialized application. This book explains:Collaborative filtering techniques that enable online retailers to recommend products or media Methods of clustering to detect groups of similar items in a large dataset Search engine features -- crawlers, indexers, query engines, and the PageRank algorithm Optimization algorithms that search millions of possible solutions to a problem and choose the best one Bayesian filtering, used in spam filters for classifying documents based on word types and other features Using decision trees not only to make predictions, but to model the way decisions are made Predicting numerical values rather than classifications to build price models Support vector machines to match people in online dating sites Non-negative matrix factorization to find the independent features in a dataset Evolving intelligence for problem solving -- how a computer develops its skill by improving its own code the more it plays a game Each chapter includes exercises for extending the algorithms to make them more powerful. Go beyond simple database-backed applications and put the wealth of Internet data to work for you. "Bravo! I cannot think of a better way for a developer to first learn these algorithms and methods, nor can I think of a better way for me (an old AI dog) to reinvigorate my knowledge of the details."-- Dan Russell, Google "Toby's book does a great job of breaking down the complex subject matter of machine-learning algorithms into practical, easy-to-understand examples that can be directly applied to analysis of social interaction across the Web today. If I had this book two years ago, it would have saved precious time going down some fruitless paths."-- Tim Wolters, CTO, Collective Intellect

    In The Master Algorithm, Pedro Domingos lifts the veil to give us a peek inside the learning machines that power Google, Amazon, and your smartphone. He assembles a blueprint for the future universal learner--the Master Algorithm--and discusses what it will mean for business, science, and society. If data-ism is today's philosophy, this book is its bible.

    Several resources exist for individual pieces of this data science stack, but only with the Python Data Science Handbook do you get them all—IPython, NumPy, Pandas, Matplotlib, Scikit-Learn, and other related tools.Working scientists and data crunchers familiar with reading and writing Python code will find this comprehensive desk reference ideal for tackling day-to-day issues: manipulating, transforming, and cleaning data; visualizing different types of data; and using data to build statistical or machine learning models. Quite simply, this is the must-have reference for scientific computing in Python.With this handbook, you’ll learn how to use: * IPython and Jupyter: provide computational environments for data scientists using Python * NumPy: includes the ndarray for efficient storage and manipulation of dense data arrays in Python * Pandas: features the DataFrame for efficient storage and manipulation of labeled/columnar data in Python * Matplotlib: includes capabilities for a flexible range of data visualizations in Python * Scikit-Learn: for efficient and clean Python implementations of the most important and established machine learning algorithms

    Mitchell covers the field of machine learning, the study of algorithms that allow computer programs to automatically improve through experience and that automatically infer general laws from specific data.

    Non- mathematical readers will appreciate the intuitive explanations of the techniques while an emphasis on problem-solving with real data across a wide variety of applications will aid practitioners who wish to extend their expertise. Readers should have knowledge of basic statistical ideas, such as correlation and linear regression analysis. While the text is biased against complex equations, a mathematical background is needed for advanced topics. Dr. Kuhn is a Director of Non-Clinical Statistics at Pfizer Global R&D in Groton Connecticut. He has been applying predictive models in the pharmaceutical and diagnostic industries for over 15 years and is the author of a number of R packages. Dr. Johnson has more than a decade of statistical consulting and predictive modeling experience in pharmaceutical research and development. He is a co-founder of Arbor Analytics, a firm specializing in predictive modeling and is a former Director of Statistics at Pfizer Global R&D. His scholarly work centers on the application and development of statistical methodology and learning algorithms. Applied Predictive Modeling covers the overall predictive modeling process, beginning with the crucial steps of data preprocessing, data splitting and foundations of model tuning. The text then provides intuitive explanations of numerous common and modern regression and classification techniques, always with an emphasis on illustrating and solving real data problems. Addressing practical concerns extends beyond model fitting to topics such as handling class imbalance, selecting predictors, and pinpointing causes of poor model performance-all of which are problems that occur frequently in practice. The text illustrates all parts of the modeling process through many hands-on, real-life examples. And every chapter contains extensive R code f

    The long-anticipated revision of this best-selling text offers the most comprehensive, up-to-date introduction to the theory and practice of artificial intelligence. *NEW-Nontechnical learning material-Accompanies each part of the book. *NEW-The Internet as a sample application for intelligent systems-Added in several places including logical agents, planning, and natural language. *NEW-Increased coverage of material - Includes expanded coverage of: default reasoning and truth maintenance systems, including multi-agent/distributed AI and game theory; probabilistic approaches to learning including EM; more detailed descriptions of probabilistic inference algorithms. *NEW-Updated and expanded exercises-75% of the exercises are revised, with 100 new exercises. *NEW-On-line Java software. *Makes it easy for students to do projects on the web using intelligent agents. *A unified, agent-based approach to AI-Organizes the material around the task of building intelligent agents. *Comprehensive, up-to-date coverage-Includes a unified view of the field organized around the rational decision making pa

    Its techniques are widely applied in engineering, science, finance, and commerce. This book is designed for a short course on machine learning. It is a short course, not a hurried course. From over a decade of teaching this material, we have distilled what we believe to be the core topics that every student of the subject should know. We chose the title `learning from data' that faithfully describes what the subject is about, and made it a point to cover the topics in a story-like fashion. Our hope is that the reader can learn all the fundamentals of the subject by reading the book cover to cover. ---- Learning from data has distinct theoretical and practical tracks. In this book, we balance the theoretical and the practical, the mathematical and the heuristic. Our criterion for inclusion is relevance. Theory that establishes the conceptual framework for learning is included, and so are heuristics that impact the performance of real learning systems. ---- Learning from data is a very dynamic field. Some of the hot techniques and theories at times become just fads, and others gain traction and become part of the field. What we have emphasized in this book are the necessary fundamentals that give any student of learning from data a solid foundation, and enable him or her to venture out and explore further techniques and theories, or perhaps to contribute their own. ---- The authors are professors at California Institute of Technology (Caltech), Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI), and National Taiwan University (NTU), where this book is the main text for their popular courses on machine learning. The authors also consult extensively with financial and commercial companies on machine learning applications, and have led winning teams in machine learning competitions.

    In this practical guide, data strategy consultant Max Shron shows you how to put the why before the how, through an often-overlooked set of analytical skills.Thinking with Data helps you learn techniques for turning data into knowledge you can use. You’ll learn a framework for defining your project, including the data you want to collect, and how you intend to approach, organize, and analyze the results. You’ll also learn patterns of reasoning that will help you unveil the real problem that needs to be solved.Learn a framework for scoping data projectsUnderstand how to pin down the details of an idea, receive feedback, and begin prototypingUse the tools of arguments to ask good questions, build projects in stages, and communicate resultsExplore data-specific patterns of reasoning and learn how to build more useful argumentsDelve into causal reasoning and learn how it permeates data workPut everything together, using extended examples to see the method of full problem thinking in action

    Whether you're a student, a professional, or just curious about statistical analysis, Head First's brain-friendly formula helps you get a firm grasp of statistics so you can understand key points and actually use them. Learn to present data visually with charts and plots; discover the difference between taking the average with mean, median, and mode, and why it's important; learn how to calculate probability and expectation; and much more.Head First Statistics is ideal for high school and college students taking statistics and satisfies the requirements for passing the College Board's Advanced Placement (AP) Statistics Exam. With this book, you'll:Study the full range of topics covered in first-year statistics Tackle tough statistical concepts using Head First's dynamic, visually rich format proven to stimulate learning and help you retain knowledge Explore real-world scenarios, ranging from casino gambling to prescription drug testing, to bring statistical principles to life Discover how to measure spread, calculate odds through probability, and understand the normal, binomial, geometric, and Poisson distributions Conduct sampling, use correlation and regression, do hypothesis testing, perform chi square analysis, and moreBefore you know it, you'll not only have mastered statistics, you'll also see how they work in the real world. Head First Statistics will help you pass your statistics course, and give you a firm understanding of the subject so you can apply the knowledge throughout your life.

    With it, you'll learn how to write Python programs that work with large collections of unstructured text. You'll access richly annotated datasets using a comprehensive range of linguistic data structures, and you'll understand the main algorithms for analyzing the content and structure of written communication.Packed with examples and exercises, Natural Language Processing with Python will help you: Extract information from unstructured text, either to guess the topic or identify "named entities" Analyze linguistic structure in text, including parsing and semantic analysis Access popular linguistic databases, including WordNet and treebanks Integrate techniques drawn from fields as diverse as linguistics and artificial intelligenceThis book will help you gain practical skills in natural language processing using the Python programming language and the Natural Language Toolkit (NLTK) open source library. If you're interested in developing web applications, analyzing multilingual news sources, or documenting endangered languages -- or if you're simply curious to have a programmer's perspective on how human language works -- you'll find Natural Language Processing with Python both fascinating and immensely useful.