It’s been a rather quiet summer on Data Science Central with fewer blog posts being published than at other times of the year, but I guess it shouldn’t be too much of a surprise – DSC has had to compete against summer holidays, the Euro 2016 football tournament and the Rio 2016 Olympics.
Of the relatively few that have been published, there have been a few gems. At the time of writing, the 5 blog posts on this list have been read by almost 60,000 of you.
If you haven’t seen any of them yet, here’s your chance to catch up.
I hope you enjoy reading them as much as I did.
5 Free Data Science eBooks For Your Summer Reading List
So you wanna be a data scientist, huh?
Well, you’re gonna need some serious skills, and it’ll take you a long time to learn them. Decades. Still with me? Still wanna be a data scientist?
In that case you need to know where to start. I suggest you hit the books for a while and try to get a feel for the kinds of skills you’ll need, and you could do a lot worse than start with the books in this blog post.
They’re a mix of books about data, analysis, statistics and R programming and are great for early-stage data scientists. There’s even a book about data analysis for the life sciences in here, and a bonus book at the end about data cleaning. And best of all, they’re all free!
Read it here:
http://www.datasciencecentral.com/profiles/blogs/5-free-data-scienc…
How to Analyze Big Data with Excel
Feeling pretty confident now, aren’t we? You know what you need to learn and you’ve done some preliminary bookwork. It’s time to get your hands dirty, jump in and start actually doing stuff with real data.
Are you an expert with Hadoop, MapReduce, Python and R yet? No worries – how about starting out with something that you’re familiar with. This blog post will help you get started with analysing Big Data using Microsoft Excel.
It’s focussed mainly towards data-driven marketers, but is a good blog post for anyone looking to get started with data science and analysing Big Data without specialist tools.
Read it here:
http://www.datasciencecentral.com/profiles/blogs/how-to-analyze-big…
Data scientist paid $500k can barely code!
You’re well on the path to being a solid data scientist now.
Background research? Check.
Bookwork? Check
Experience working with actual data? Check.
It’s time you started looking for a data science job then, but what kind of wages can you expect in your first job? Well, that all depends on the nature of the job, but data science wages can be pretty substantial, even if you have gaps in your skillset – as this blog post shows.
There are many different types of data scientist leverage different combinations of skills, so if your skillset has a gap, fear not – there’s still space for you in data science.
Read it here:
http://www.datasciencecentral.com/profiles/blogs/data-scientist-pai…
Why Good Data Scientists are Worth the Big Bucks
Wow, half a million bucks a year just for shuffling a bit of data around! Well, it’s a bit more involved than that. Actually, good data scientists are worth every penny they earn, and for good reason. This blog post explains that being a good data scientist is all about dedication, foundations and instinct.
Read it here:
http://www.datasciencecentral.com/profiles/blogs/why-good-data-scie…
Dilbert’s 20 funniest cartoons on Big Data
Well now you have your dream data science job, are secure in your analytical future and are just rolling in cash.
Yeah, right, ‘cos it really is that easy – I’ve been a data scientist for a couple of decades and I’m still waiting.
It might be quite a good thing if you retain your sense of humour. You’ll need it when your boss says to you ‘have a little look at this data set for me – it shouldn’t take you long’ and you realise he’s just handed you a decade of work.
This last blog post will help in the dark days at about year 4…
Read it here:
http://www.datasciencecentral.com/profiles/blogs/dilbert-s-20-funni…
So there you have it, 5 of the hottest blog posts this summer. If you’re just starting your data science journey you could do a lot worse than read these and learn from what they have to offer.
About the Author
Lee Baker is an award-winning software creator with a passion for turning data into a story.
A proud Yorkshireman, he now lives by the sparkling shores of the East Coast of Scotland. Physicist, statistician and programmer, child of the flower-power psychedelic ‘60s, it’s amazing he turned out so normal!
Turning his back on a promising academic career to do something more satisfying, as the CEO and co-founder of Chi-Squared Innovations he now works double the hours for half the pay and 10 times the stress – but 100 times the fun!
He also wanted to be rich, famous and good looking. Ah well…
PS – Don’t forget to connect with me in Twitter: @eelrekab
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