On 27 Feb 01,, hzi wrote (re: [R] Newbie question: what are the a):> Hi - > > I?m a medical graduate student. I?m totally new to R,.....What about the learning curve? > Is it something that is awfully hard to learn?Yes, it is something to consider, but well worth the effort if you do a lot of analysis. I found one of the best books when you are learning the environment is Spector, P. 1994. "An introduction to S and S-PLUS". Duxbury Press. Although it is written for S, much of it is still very useful for R. Also see Maindonald, J.H. 2000. "Data analysis and graphics using R -- An introduction" (available through the CRAN web site) Sam Sam McClatchie, Research scientist (fisheries acoustics)))))))))) NIWA (National Institute of Water & Atmospheric Research Ltd) PO Box 14 901, Kilbirnie, Wellington, New Zealand s.mcclatchie at niwa.cri.nz /\ ...>><xX(?> // \\ /// \\\ //// \\\\ /// <?)Xx><< ///// \\\\\\ ><(((?> >><(((?> ...>><xX(?>O<?)Xx><< -.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.- r-help mailing list -- Read http://www.ci.tuwien.ac.at/~hornik/R/R-FAQ.html Send "info", "help", or "[un]subscribe" (in the "body", not the subject !) To: r-help-request at stat.math.ethz.ch _._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._
But I have some doubts regarding R: how does using R differ from using software packages, like SPSS (which is the one I?m used to)? What are the advantages of using R when compared? Is flexibility an issue? What about the learning curve? Is it It depends on your purpose. I would still use spss to produce tables, but R for statistical analysis. Marwan Khawaja Fafo Institute for Applied Social Science>-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.- r-help mailing list -- Read http://www.ci.tuwien.ac.at/~hornik/R/R-FAQ.html Send "info", "help", or "[un]subscribe" (in the "body", not the subject !) To: r-help-request at stat.math.ethz.ch _._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._
The discussion on R and SPSS leads me to the question wether it is planned to adopt crosstabulations in R (like Splus or better with some enhancements: not only chi-square but also some measures of association)? Best regards //wenzel matiaske -.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.- r-help mailing list -- Read http://www.ci.tuwien.ac.at/~hornik/R/R-FAQ.html Send "info", "help", or "[un]subscribe" (in the "body", not the subject !) To: r-help-request at stat.math.ethz.ch _._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._
>>>>> "Wenzel" == Wenzel Matiaske <wm at fl.sdu.dk> writes:Wenzel> The discussion on R and SPSS leads me to the question Wenzel> wether it is planned to adopt crosstabulations in R Wenzel> (like Splus or better with some enhancements: not only Wenzel> chi-square but also some measures of association)? there has been something like that for quite a long time : --> help(xtabs) however, only \chi^2 at the moment. Martin Maechler <maechler at stat.math.ethz.ch> http://stat.ethz.ch/~maechler/ Seminar fuer Statistik, ETH-Zentrum LEO D10 Leonhardstr. 27 ETH (Federal Inst. Technology) 8092 Zurich SWITZERLAND phone: x-41-1-632-3408 fax: ...-1228 <>< -.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.- r-help mailing list -- Read http://www.ci.tuwien.ac.at/~hornik/R/R-FAQ.html Send "info", "help", or "[un]subscribe" (in the "body", not the subject !) To: r-help-request at stat.math.ethz.ch _._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._
Hi -
I?m a medical graduate student. I?m totally new to R, although I had heard
of S before. I read it was GNU free software, and since I also use Linux, I
decide to check it out.
But I have some doubts regarding R: how does using R differ from using
software packages, like SPSS (which is the one I?m used to)? What are the
advantages of using R when compared? Is flexibility an issue? What about the
learning curve? Is it something that is awfully hard to learn? And the
documentation seems to be rather sparse, unless you?re willling to buy a book
(no, I?m not some "cheap" person, I?m a student from Brazil - things
are not so cheap for me...which is one of the reasons free software is
attractive to me).
Thank you,
Best regards to all.
Henry
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL:
https://stat.ethz.ch/pipermail/r-help/attachments/20010227/ef0f77b2/attachment.html
>On Tue, 27 Feb 2001, hzi wrote: > I?m a medical graduate student. I?m totally new to R, although I > had heard of S before. I read it was GNU free software, and since I > also use Linux, I decide to check it out. > But I have some doubts regarding R: how does using R differ from > using software packages, like SPSS (which is the one I?m used to)? > What are the advantages of using R when compared? Is flexibility an > issue? What about the learning curve? Is it something that is awfully > hard to learn? And the documentation seems to be rather sparse, unless > you?re willling to buy a book (no, I?m not some "cheap" person, I?m a > student from Brazil - things are not so cheap for me...which is one of > the reasons free software is attractive to me).I would say that using free software is not only about money: as a graduate student, you will surely have to work in another lab, and probably in another country. How to be sure that your future employer has also SPSS (or any other commercial package you have used during your PhD)? If you learn R, and then go in a lab where they do not use R, you should easily convince them at least to install it; if they use S-Plus, then you already have the background. AFAIK, among the free statistical softwares, R has no competitor. Emmanuel Paradis -.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.- r-help mailing list -- Read http://www.ci.tuwien.ac.at/~hornik/R/R-FAQ.html Send "info", "help", or "[un]subscribe" (in the "body", not the subject !) To: r-help-request at stat.math.ethz.ch _._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._