Lab 1: Friday, April 7, 2000

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Intro
Logistical Bidness
    Baby Shortridge
    Getting ahold of me
    Office Hours
    Computer accounts?

Intro to S-Plus
    History
        Based on S
        Vast statistical analysis environment
        Originally command line and source script-driven interface
        Windows versions have a GUI environment wrap on the original
        Sometimes command line is still the way to go!
    Resources
        Help within SP2000
        on-line
        Becker, Chambers, & Wilks ("Blue Book")
        Joel's Spatial S-Plus book
    S-Plus data model and environment
        Object oriented
        Parses well; generally knows what you mean
        Irritating quirks crop up often - steep learning curve
    What is S-Plus 2000?
        I'm just learning it now
        Lots is possible with the interface
        Data import straightforward
        Graphics are much easier
    Script files vs. GUI

S-Plus Tutorial
    Logging in at the Star Lab
        guest, no password, should work fine
    Starting S-plus
        In the Start/Programs/Splus menu
    Visual Demo
        In Help menu
        Pay special attention to the data section
    A bit of practice with the GUI
        Grab this Excel sheet with SAT score information; copy it to the desktop
        Import it into S-Plus
        Summarize the US information (mean, variance)
        Plot a histogram
        Develop a linear regression model to predict score based on percent of those who take the test
        Look at summary plots. How good is the model? Which states are poorly modeled?
    Running a script
        At least at first the code for the homework will be done for you as a script
        This is a sample script for you to examine
        Download it to the desktop
        Run the script from inside S-Plus
        use sink("filename") to send text output to a file rather than to the screen

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