Disqus - Latest Comments for lenwood

Re: Why You Shouldn’t be a Data Science Generalist

Chris Leonard — Tue, 18 Dec 2018 11:15:42 -0000

Nice article, I agree with specialization. I'd argue that another discipline should be included in this list, visualization. All data scientists create charts, but creating a complex chart that's simple to understand is a skill worth developing. There are "data scientists" that spend all of their time in ggplot, tableau or D3.

Re: Quickly Categorize Messy Data | R Blog | r-directory

Chris Leonard — Thu, 28 Jul 2016 08:07:16 -0000

This sounds like data cleaning to me. I don't think there's a package that will do this for you, but R has dozens of functions which could help with this, I use some of them in this categorization example. I'd recommend writing a function that iterates over the data and updates the input to be what you're looking for. If you get stuck along the way, post a question over at StackOverflow.

Re: R vs Excel for Data Analysis | R Blog | r-directory

Chris Leonard — Thu, 28 Jul 2016 07:58:37 -0000

Welcome to R. It's a great tool, and will help you become more effective in your work. For a start, have a look at Try R. If you still want more, I list several options in the E-books & Tutorials pages of this site. Good luck!

Re: R vs Excel for Data Analysis | R Blog | r-directory

Chris Leonard — Wed, 06 Jan 2016 10:31:30 -0000

Good catch! Thanks for posting. I'll update next time I publish a post.

Re: Data Wrangler vs Google Refine | R Blog | r-directory

Chris Leonard — Mon, 23 Nov 2015 00:41:52 -0000

That is a limitation, but you can use a subset of your data to define
the manipulations then export the Python code that achieves this. If
you're regularly working with larger data sets then you may have better
luck with the R packages plyr or data tables, or even Python's Pandas
library. There are definitely some good options out there.

Re: Machine Learning Packages in R | R Blog | r-directory

Chris Leonard — Mon, 23 Nov 2015 00:07:37 -0000

Thanks Jordan, absolutely true. I didn't include Caret here because it doesn't perform calculations itself, but its a great resource when comparing algorithms or if you don't want to use packages with a common syntax.

Re: The growth of a personal tech blog

Chris Leonard — Thu, 24 Sep 2015 18:11:44 -0000

> It really surprises me that more developers don’t keep active blogs.
I've had this discussion with a few other people over time, most that I've asked don't have any idea what they'd say. Others don't want to take the time. My experience is similar to yours though, blogging helps to clarify ideas & solidify things I'm learning. I don't do it now as much as I have in the past, but I really enjoy it. Having readers is icing on the cake, but definitely not the main reason.

Re: R vs Excel for Data Analysis | R Blog | r-directory

Chris Leonard — Tue, 10 Feb 2015 21:34:28 -0000

2 of my coworkers have "seen the light" and are beginning to work with R. I doubt the rest ever will because they aren't interested in statistics or programming.

Re: Data Visualization with ggplot | R Blog | r-directory

Chris Leonard — Fri, 24 Oct 2014 10:36:43 -0000

Thanks for your feedback. Happy to help.

Re: R vs Excel for Data Analysis | R Blog | r-directory

Chris Leonard — Fri, 24 Oct 2014 10:35:49 -0000

That is the one and only reason that I still use Excel daily. I'm now proficient enough with R that I could use it for all of my analysis work. I'm the only member of my team that uses R, so whether I like it or not, Excel will be part of my daily routine for quite a while.

Re: Data Visualization with ggplot | R Blog | r-directory

Chris Leonard — Wed, 30 Apr 2014 12:29:22 -0000

You bet, glad to help.

Re: Data Visualization with ggplot | R Blog | r-directory

Chris Leonard — Tue, 08 Apr 2014 23:43:25 -0000

Thanks for the feedback.

Re: R vs Excel for Data Analysis | R Blog | r-directory

Chris Leonard — Sat, 15 Mar 2014 10:17:39 -0000

Ha, that's a great analogy & totally correct. Thanks for the comment!

Re: Working With CSV Files in R | R Blog | r-directory

Chris Leonard — Sat, 15 Mar 2014 10:15:16 -0000

You're absolutely correct. I've made the update. Thanks for catching this.

Re: Folder Structure for Data Analysis | R Blog | r-directory

Chris Leonard — Sat, 15 Mar 2014 09:54:47 -0000

Take a look at the book An Introduction to Statistical Learning (the PDF is free for download. It introduces a number of algorithms, along with the R code on how to implement them. http://www-bcf.usc.edu/~gar...

Re: Data Visualization with ggplot | R Blog | r-directory

Chris Leonard — Sat, 15 Mar 2014 09:50:44 -0000

I'm glad to help.

Re: Data Wrangler vs Google Refine | R Blog | r-directory

Chris Leonard — Thu, 14 Nov 2013 10:39:47 -0000

Thanks for sharing, first that I've seen this. Data Wrangler is still available, though they make no commitment about the future. Since posting this review I've switched to using the reshape package. Its use is pretty straightforward, and I like that it allows me to stay in R.

Re: Five Computers · A sample of SV

Chris Leonard — Thu, 01 Aug 2013 13:59:15 -0000

I started using Jekyll on a site about a year ago. I absolutely love it; simple, secure and cheap to host. I have considered moving my primary site over from Wordpress. I hadn't heard of Pelican before, but I like Python more than Ruby and will take a look at it.

Re: A general django project structure or folder layout

Chris Leonard — Sun, 28 Apr 2013 15:46:44 -0000

That makes sense. Initially I did set my site up on Apache, which explains why I read that. I've since come to realize that Apache may not be the best choice for my project, so I may end up switching. At any rate, thanks for the detailed response.

Re: A general django project structure or folder layout

Chris Leonard — Sat, 27 Apr 2013 09:44:07 -0000

Thanks for this, very helpful for newbies. Quick clarification though, I thought it was bad practice to have the Django project files within the root of the domain? Isn't that a security risk? I can't find where I read this, but I found an article claiming that django_root needs to be next to public_html, not within it. Can you clarify?

Re: Why Google Now is Awesome

Chris Leonard — Fri, 19 Apr 2013 13:26:27 -0000

I've loved this feature of Android since I upgraded to 4.0 last fall. This past weekend it creeped me out though. In January my wife & I spent time in Ft Worth and had dinner at a local restaurant. It was a grab & go deal, we were only there for about 30 mins. Last weekend we were driving through Ft Worth again, one of the cards on my phone was directions to that restaurant. Google Now is creepy accurate if it can 1) nail the restaurant I'm eating at by GPS and 2) retain that info for a couple of months and recommend that I return there.

98% of the time Google Now's recommendations are applicable and helpful. That one made me wonder what else they're tracking.

Re: Campus Ministry Partnerships

Chris Leonard — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 12:17:41 -0000

I really like your suggestion about building trust among groups through regular prayer. It strikes me that the benefits of that practice extend beyond a growing community. I also really like the practical example set by Jackson Senyonga. We do indeed need one another.

Re: Friday reviews roundup

Chris Leonard — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 12:10:17 -0000

Thanks for the mention and the link to Lost in Search! I still love your product, blogging is more fun when you link to others to expand their ideas or support your own, and your tool makes that a snap. Keep up the good work.