EPBI 415: Statistical Programming (Spring 2014)

Instructor (up to Feb. 26^th): Tomas Radivoyevitch, Ph.D., Assistant Professor

Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Medicine, BRB-G19

Case Western Reserve University

Tel: 216-368-1965; Fax: 216-368-1969; e-mail: txr24@case.edu

Course website: http://epbi-radivot.cwru.edu/EPBI415

Required Reading:

A First Course in Statistical Programming with R, W. J. Braun and D. J. Murdoch, 2007.

Solutions to some exercises & examples, http://www.stats.uwo.ca/faculty/braun/statprog/

The Art of R Programming: a tour of statistical software design, by Norman Matloff, 2011.

Class Files: http://epbi-radivot.cwru.edu/EPBI415/files14

Meeting Place and Times: WG-73, Mondays and Wednesdays, 10:00 AM to 11:15 AM.

Computer Laboratory: WG-63

Office Hours: By appointment

Grading: 25% homework (due at midnight on Mondays), 25% Midterm. The rest is TBA.

Links: (R) http://www.r-project.org/;

Course Description: Programming with R, this course emphasizes sound practices and numerical methods commonly used in statistical science. R is a high-level, open-source platform now vital in statistical computing, especially for creating and sharing applications that implement new and customized methods. Topics include effective programming style and structure, R for customized graphics, and Monte Carlo simulation. Previous experience in R is advised.

Tentative Schedule:

Week 1, Jan. 13 & 15: RStudio; vectors (ch 2 Matloff; ch 2 Braun & Murdoch)

Week 2, Jan. 22: matrices, arrays (ch 3 Matloff; ch 6 Braun & Murdoch)

Week 3, Jan. 27 & 29: lists, dataframes, factors (ch 4, 5 & 6 Matloff; ch 2 Braun & Murdoch)

Week 4, Feb. 3 & 5: Programming: Flow control (for, if, while, repeat), functions, debugging (ch 7, 13 Matloff; ch 4 Braun & Murdoch)

Week 5, Feb 10 & 12: base graphics (ch 12 Matloff; ch 3 Braun & Murdoch), ggplot2

Week 6, Feb 17 & 19: Simulation. Rejection & importance sampling (ch 8 Matloff; ch 5 B&M)

Week 7, Feb 24 (mid-term) & 26 (go over mid-term)

Other Instructor takes over.

Weeks 8-15, TBA: e.g. Newton-Raphson (ch 7 Braun & Murdoch), bbmle, R packaging; S3 & S4 classes and methods (ch 9 Matloff); XML; Interface to C (ch 15 Matloff); R as backend of website; R Markdown

Notes: Mar 10 & 11 = Spring Break (no class), Apr 27^th = last class