This web page is created for students in the Department of Statistics and Actuarial Science at the University of Waterloo. The aim is to present an overview of software packages which eventually will become essential or at least useful for statisticians.
This is an ongoing project and only part of the content on this page is actually written on behalf of the UWaterloo Department of Statistics and Actuarial Science. For topics we have not covered yet, we provide links to web pages and documents that we find useful.
The content specifically created for this web page so far is:
Tcl introduction (PDF) with R-Source
IDEs are used to add efficiency to the programming workflow. Many IDEs exist and their strengths are dependent on the programming language.
UWaterloo: Emacs and Eclipse (PDF) can be used for most programming languages including R, C, Java, and also LaTeX.
RStudio good R IDE that also integrates Sweave and knitR support.
LaTeX is a document preparation system which is used by many academics and students to write up their projects, assignments, publications and presentation slides.
Search the Internet for an introduction to LaTeX or read a book. Many good sources exist.
A popular book, based on Amazon ranking, is More Math Into LaTeX published by Springer, and for UWaterloo students available for free from the Springerlink website. The author made a set of free available videos for getting you easily started.
Once you have figured out the basics of LaTeX, inform yourself about:
AUCTeX: a great LaTeX editing mode in Emacs
ispell: spell checking with Emacs
Beamer: writing presentation slides with LaTeX
TikZ (PDF): creating graphics in LaTeX; TikZ examples
LaTeXDraw: create graphics with a drawing program
Introduction to R, Emacs and Eclipse
UWaterloo: R introduction (PDF) (R, Emacs, Eclipse, Help)
Data manipulation
Graphics: base, grid, lattice and ggplot2
Web page: Gallery of R graphics
External file: Basic graphics in R (PDF)
Book: Use R: Lattice, Lattice web page
Web page: Hadley Wickham's ggplot2 web page
Book: Use R: ggplot2
Sweave and knitR let you mix together LaTeX source with R source. This makes for a great way to write your assignments.
Web page: An Sweave Demo
Web page: knitR
Many good books on the topic now exist.
Functions and Methods
UWaterloo: Functions and Methods (PDF)
Object oriented model
External file: A (Not So) Short Introduction to S4 (PDF) by Christophe Genolini
Building your own library
External file: Creating R Packages: A Tutorial (PDF) by Friedrich Leisch
Web page: devtools by Hadley Wickham
Accessing C and C++ from within R
Book: Seamless R and C++ Integration with Rcpp by Dirk Eddelbuettel
External file: Calling C code from R an introduction (PPT) by Sigal Blay
Introduction to Tcl
UWaterloo: Tcl Introduction (PDF) with R-source
The tcltk library for R
Book: Programming Graphical User Interfaces in R by Michael Lawrence and John Verzani
Geometry managers
UWaterloo: TK geometry manager (PDF) with R-source
Information (including access codes) about free e-learning resources for students can be found on slide/page 7.
Information on SAS Certification for students can be found on slide/page 10, and on the SAS Certification website. You’ll need to e-mail certification@sas.com with proof that you’re a University of Waterloo student, and they’ll e-mail you a $90 discount voucher.
C and C++
External file: C and C++ in 5 days by Philip Machanick
Regular expressions
Book: Mastering Regular Expressions by Jeffrey Friedl
Basics of UNIX
Web page: UNIX tutorial for beginners
UWaterloo math servers
UWaterloo statistics students have access to several servers to run their simulations on. You will find all the necessary information on the Math Faculty Computing Facility (MFCF) website.
To access the servers, login from anywhere via ssh.
ssh username@linux.math.uwaterloo.ca
Consider setting up ssh keys.
Once logged into the servers, you may then have to change your limit options.
limit cputime unlimited
limit filesize unlimited
This can happen automatically when you login by adjusting the .cshrc file in your home directory. Replace the "limit cputime" line with "unlimit cputime".
Use nohup to run your process. For example to run an R simulation use
nohup R CMD BATCH myRfile.R &
Author: Adrian Waddell <arwaddel@math.uwaterloo.ca>
Date: 2014-02-13
David Landriault
Tier II Canada Research Chair
Ken Seng Tan
Sun Life Fellow
Ruodu Wang
University Research Chair
Gord Willmot
Munich Re Chair in Insurance
Tony Wirjanto
University Research Chair
Grace Yi
University Research Chair
