Prerequisites
Install R and RStudio
All examples in this book are run in an R environment. You also need a recent version of RStudio, which is a software application that facilitates how you interact with R
. It is developed by data enthusiasts who consider statistics to be more than just simulations, formulas and proofs. RStudio emphasizes the following:
Version control: Why I should use version control especially for the solo data analyst.
Reproducible research: seamless integration with RMarkdown for creating dynamic documents and presentations
Creating R Packages: seamless integration with the devtools package for creating software that implements your statistical method or analysis.
R Packages
The following packages will be called upon at some point, so please install them before getting started with the tutorials. Enter the following command in R
:
install.packages(c("pacman", "knitr", "data.table", "rmarkdown", "tidyverse",
"boot", "Hmisc"))
Introduction to R
Try out the interactive tutorial: http://swirlstats.com/
Background Reading
The greatest thing about R
is that there are so many people out there willing to help you. R
users are constantly writing tutorials and creating packages to make your analysis tasks easier. Here is a very targeted list that I suggest reading prior to starting the tutorials