Using Tensorflow with R
Jun 27,
2019
When examining the available selection of machine learning environments, even the most ardent R user may suffer some pangs of Python envy. Most machine learning environments, such as Google’s Tensorflow, are programmed in C++ for maximum performance and maximum utilization of hardware resources such as GPUs (graphics processing units). The Tensorflow API, however, is designed […]
Loading New R Packages into AzureML
Jun 18,
2019
Microsoft Azure ML provides over 500 individual R packages for use in R scripts. It is almost certain, however, that at some point you will wish to use an R package not available by default. Several years ago, before Revolution Analytics was acquired by Microsoft, Andrie deVries created a very useful package called miniCRAN. This […]
How to Interpret a Q-Q Plot
Jun 4,
2019
Statisticians have developed a remarkably powerful set of tools for analyzing normally distributed data. Too bad real data is never normally distributed. Fortunately for us, most of the time “close enough” is all we really need. But how are we to know? One quick and effective method is a look at a Q-Q plot. The […]
Randomly Sampling Rows in R
May 22,
2019
It’s impossible to imagine a data scientist who does not have to randomly sample datasets on a regular basis. Most employ the useful and easy function sample( ), defined in R’s base namespace. Let’s take a closer look at sample( ) and then take a look at a flexible alternative that is just as easy […]
Turning Your AzureML Experiment into a Web Service
Apr 16,
2019
Great! You’ve created a promising machine learning model using AzureML Studio. How do you make it available to colleagues for practical use? In Microsoft-speak, how do you “operationalize” it? The AzureML Studio makes it very easy to convert an existing experiment into an Azure web service that can be accessed from any application that supports […]