Beginning R: The Statistical Programming Language

by Mark Gardener

Key Features This book will be light enough to appeal to beginning users, yet robust enough for a seasoned user to learn from it because it: Appeals to programmers wanting to narrow the skills gap (McKinsey Consulting states nearly 200,000 people will be needed with R knowledge in the US alone). Guides the reader in cutting cost in whatever industry they work in. Teaches the basics of the R language rather than just recipes by providing simple data examples that allow users to see what is happening while permitting complex analysis. It can be used as a complete reference to perform simple to complex tasks in R. About the Book: Beginning R: The Statistical Programming Language R, an open source statistical programming language is a computer program that does statistics, as well as produce publication quality graphs. It currently has an estimate user base of 2 million users. It is unlike many computer programs in that the user must type commands using the keyboard. Because it is a complex language, the user needs to learn to "speak R". This book is about data analysis and the programming language called R. This is rapidly becoming the de-facto standard amongst professionals and is used in every conceivable discipline from science and medicine to business and engineering. This book delves into the language of R and makes it accessible using simple data examples to explore its power and versatility. In learning how to "speak R" you will unlock its potential and gain better insights into tackling even the most complex of data analysis tasks. Content "Introduction Chapter 1: Introducing R: What It Is and How to Get It Chapter 2: Starting Out: Becoming Familiar with R Chapter 3: Starting Out: Working with Objects Chapter 4: Data: Descriptive Statistics and Tabulation Chapter 5: Data: Distribution Chapter 6: Simple Hypothesis Testing Chapter 7: Introduction to Graphical Analysis Chapter 8: Formula Notation and Complex Statistics Chapter 9: Manipulating Data and Extracting

Genres: Programming

504 pages, Paperback

First published May 22, 2012

Reviews

[Arun Mahendrakar · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beginning R is a very good book to learn R. It does one thing and one thing very well - how to do data analysis in R. You need some mathematics and statistics background understand why you are doing ANOVA, for example, and how to interpret its results. But then again, expecting one book to do all is not realistic. The book promises to teach R and as mentioned above, it does it pretty well.

I found the chapters on ANOVA, Regression, and graphs more informative when compared with other similar books.

Most part of the book uses native functions of R. This simplifies the learning process and doesn't overwhelm the user with installation of the plethora of CRAN packages.

I think this can be your first book on R and I for sure learned a few more things in R.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was an excellent book for anyone who has no background knowledge of computer programming, but who wants to learn R. I learned a ton about R through this book, and would recommend it to anyone.