R for Everyone Advanced Analytics and Graphics

by Lander, Jared P.

• ISBN13: 9780134546926
• ISBN10: 013454692X
• Edition: 2nd
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2017-06-08
• Publisher: Addison-Wesley Professional

Summary

Using the open source R language, you can build powerful statistical models to answer many of your most challenging questions. R has traditionally been difficult for non-statisticians to learn, and most R books assume far too much knowledge to be of help. R for Everyone is the solution.

 

Drawing on his unsurpassed experience teaching new users, professional data scientist Jared P. Lander has written the perfect tutorial for anyone new to statistical programming and modeling. Organized to make learning easy and intuitive, this guide focuses on the 20 percent of R functionality you’ll need to accomplish 80 percent of modern data tasks. Lander’s self-contained chapters start with the absolute basics, offering extensive hands-on practice and sample code. You’ll download and install R; navigate and use the R environment; master basic program control, data import, and manipulation; and walk through several essential tests. Then, building on this foundation, you’ll construct several complete models, both linear and nonlinear, and use some data mining techniques.

 

By the time you’re done, you won’t just know how to write R programs, you’ll be ready to tackle the statistical problems you care about most.

 

Coverage Includes:

• Exploring R, RStudio, and R packages
• Using R for math: variable types, vectors, calling functions, and more
• Exploiting data structures, including data.frames, matrices, and lists
• Creating attractive, intuitive statistical graphics
• Writing user-defined functions
• Controlling program flow with if, ifelse, and complex checks
• Improving program efficiency with group manipulations
• Combining and reshaping multiple datasets
• Manipulating strings using R’s facilities and regular expressions
• Creating normal, binomial, and Poisson probability distributions
• Programming basic statistics: mean, standard deviation, and t-tests
• Building linear, generalized linear, and nonlinear models
• Assessing the quality of models and variable selection
• Preventing overfitting, using the Elastic Net and Bayesian methods
• Analyzing univariate and multivariate time series data
• Grouping data via K-means and hierarchical clustering
• Preparing reports, slideshows, and web pages with knitr
• Building reusable R packages with devtools and Rcpp
• Getting involved with the R global community

Author Biography

Jared P. Lander is the owner of Lander Analytics, a statistical consulting firm based in New York City, the organizer of the New York Open Statistical Programming Meetup and an adjunct professor of statistics at Columbia University. He is also a tour guide for Scott’s Pizza Tours and an advisor to Brewla Bars, a gourmet ice pop startup. With an M.A. from Columbia University in statistics and a B.A. from Muhlenberg College in mathematics, he has experience in both academic research and industry. His work for both large and small organizations spans politics, tech startups, fund raising, music, finance, healthcare, and humanitarian relief efforts. He specializes in data management, multilevel models, machine learning, generalized linear models, visualization, data management, and statistical computing.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1: Getting R 11.1 Downloading R
1.2 R Version
1.3 32-bit vs. 64-bit
1.4 Installing
1.5 Revolution R Community Edition
1.6 Conclusion
 
Chapter 2: The R Environment
2.1 Command Line Interface
2.2 RStudio
2.3 Revolution Analytics RPE
2.4 Conclusion
 
Chapter 3: R Packages
3.1 Installing Packages
3.2 Loading Packages
3.3 Building a Package
3.4 Conclusion
 
Chapter 4: Basics of R
4.1 Basic Math
4.2 Variables
4.3 Data Types
4.4 Vectors
4.5 Calling Functions
4.6 Function Documentation
4.7 Missing Data
4.8 Conclusion
 
Chapter 5: Advanced Data Structures
5.1 data.frames
5.2 Lists
5.3 Matrices
5.4 Arrays
5.5 Conclusion
 
Chapter 6: Reading Data into R
6.1 Reading CSVs
6.2 Excel Data
6.3 Reading from Databases
6.4 Data from Other Statistical Tools
6.5 R Binary Files
6.6 Data Included with R
6.7 Extract Data from Web Sites
6.8 Conclusion
 
Chapter 7: Statistical Graphics
7.1 Base Graphics
7.2 ggplot2
7.3 Conclusion
 
Chapter 8: Writing R Functions
8.1 Hello, World!
8.2 Function Arguments
8.3 Return Values
8.4 do.call
8.5 Conclusion
 
Chapter 9: Control Statements
9.1 if and else
9.2 switch
9.3 ifelse
9.4 Compound Tests
9.5 Conclusion
 
Chapter 10: Loops, the Un-R Way to Iterate
10.1 for Loops
10.2 while Loops
10.3 Controlling Loops
10.4 Conclusion
 
Chapter 11: Group Manipulation
11.1 Apply Family
11.2 aggregate
11.3 plyr
11.4 data.table
11.5 Conclusion
 
Chapter 12: Data Reshaping
12.1 cbind and rbind
12.2 Joins
12.3 reshape2
12.4 Conclusion
 
Chapter 13: Manipulating Strings
13.1 paste
13.2 sprintf
13.3 Extracting Text
13.4 Regular Expressions
13.5 Conclusion
 
Chapter 14: Probability Distributions
14.1 Normal Distribution
14.2 Binomial Distribution
14.3 Poisson Distribution
14.4 Other Distributions
14.5 Conclusion
 
Chapter 15: Basic Statistics
15.1 Summary Statistics
15.2 Correlation and Covariance
15.3 T-Tests
15.4 ANOVA
15.5 Conclusion
 
Chapter 16: Linear Models
16.1 Simple Linear Regression
16.2 Multiple Regression
16.3 Conclusion
 
Chapter 17: Generalized Linear Models
17.1 Logistic Regression
17.2 Poisson Regression
17.3 Other Generalized Linear Models
17.4 Survival Analysis
17.5 Conclusion
 
Chapter 18: Model Diagnostics
18.1 Residuals
18.2 Comparing Models
18.3 Cross-Validation
18.4 Bootstrap
18.5 Stepwise Variable Selection
18.6 Conclusion
 
Chapter 19: Regularization and Shrinkage
19.1 Elastic Net
19.2 Bayesian Shrinkage
19.3 Conclusion
 
Chapter 20: Nonlinear Models
20.1 Nonlinear Least Squares
20.2 Splines
20.3 Generalized Additive Models
20.4 Decision Trees
20.5 Random Forests
20.6 Conclusion
 
Chapter 21: Time Series and Autocorrelation
21.1 Autoregressive Moving Average
21.2 VAR
21.3 GARCH
21.4 Conclusion
 
Chapter 22: Clustering
22.1 K-means
22.2 PAM
22.3 Hierarchical Clustering
22.4 Conclusion
 
Chapter 23: Reproducibility, Reports and Slide Shows with knitr
23.1 Installing a LATEX Program
23.2 LATEX Primer
23.3 Using knitr with LATEX
23.4 Markdown Tips
23.5 Using knitr and Markdown
23.6 pandoc
23.7 Conclusion
 
Chapter 24: Building R Packages
24.1 Folder Structure
24.2 Package Files
24.3 Package Documentation
24.4 Checking, Building and Installing
24.5 Submitting to CRAN
24.6 C++ Code
24.7 Conclusion

 
Appendix A: Real-Life Resources
A.1 Meetups
A.2 Stackoverflow
A.3 Twitter
A.4 Conferences
A.5 Web Sites
A.6 Documents
A.7 Books
A.8 Conclusion
 
Appendix B: Glossary