Month: June 2010

Predictive Analytics World Conference

A note from Predictive Analytics World  Conference


Predictive Analytics World Coming October 19-20, 2010 to Washington, DC

Dates:        October 19-20, 2010
Location:   Washington, DC

Predictive Analytics World (pawcon.com) is the business-focused event for predictive analytics professionals, managers and commercial practitioners, covering today’s commercial deployment of predictive analytics, across industries and across software vendors.  The conference delivers case studies, expertise and resources to achieve two objectives:

1) Bigger wins:  Strengthen the business impact delivered by predictive analytics

2) Broader capabilities:  Establish new opportunities with predictive analytics

The Top Experts

PAW’s October 2010 program is packed with the top predictive analytics experts, practitioners, authors and business thought leaders, including keynote speakers Piyanka Jain of PayPal, Andrew Pole of Target and Program Chair Eric Siegel, Ph.D. — plus special sessions from industry heavy-weights Usama Fayyad, Ph.D. and John F. Elder, Ph.D.

Case Studies: How the Leading Enterprises Do It

Predictive Analytics World focuses on concrete examples of deployed predictive analytics.  Hear from the horse’s mouth precisely how Fortune 500 analytics competitors and other top practitioners deploy predictive modeling, and what kind of business impact it delivers.

And the leading enterprises have responded, signing up to tell their stories. PAW’s October program includes over 25 sessions across two tracks – an “All Audiences” and an “Expert/Practitioner” track — so you can witness how predictive analytics is applied at

1-800-FLOWERS, CIBC, Corporate Executive Board, Forrester, Ingram Micro, LifeLine, MetLife, Miles Kimball, Monster, Paychex, PayPal (eBay), SunTrust, Target, UPMC Health Plan, Xerox, and Yahoo!, plus special examples from theU.S. government agencies DoD, DHS, and SSA.

October’s agenda covers hot topics and advanced methods such as social data, text mining, search marketing, risk management, survey analysis, consumer privacy, sales force optimization and other innovative applications that benefit organizations in new and creative ways.

Join PAW and access the best keynotes, sessions, exposition, expert panel, live demos, networking coffee breaks, reception, birds-of-a-feather lunches, leading brand-name enterprise leaders, and industry heavyweights in the business.

Workshops

Three pre- and post-event workshops complement the core conference program:

“The Best and the Worst of Predictive Analytics: Predictive Modeling Methods and Common Data Mining Mistakes”
Instructor:  John F. Elder, Ph.D., CEO and Founder, Elder Research, Inc.
www.predictiveanalyticsworld.com/dc/2010/predictive_modeling_methods.php

“Hands-On Predictive Analytics”
Instructor:  Dean Abbott, President, Abbott Analytics
www.predictiveanalyticsworld.com/dc/2010/handson_predictive_analytics.php

“Driving Enterprise Decisions with Business Analytics and Business Rules”
Instructor:  James Taylor, CEO, Decision Management Solutions
www.predictiveanalyticsworld.com/dc/2010/predictive_analytics_work.php

Cross-Industry Applications

Predictive Analytics World is the only conference of its kind, delivering vendor-neutral sessions across verticals such as banking, financial services, e-commerce, education, government, healthcare, high technology, insurance, non-profits, publishing, retail and telecommunications

And PAW covers the gamut of commercial applications of predictive analytics, including response modeling, customer retention with churn modeling, product recommendations, fraud detection, online marketing optimization, behavior-based advertising, insurance pricing, sales forecasting, text mining and credit scoring.

Why bring together such a wide range of endeavors?  No matter how you use predictive analytics, the story is the same:  Predicatively scoring customers optimizes business performance.  Predictive analytics initiatives across industries leverage the same core predictive modeling technology, share similar project overhead and data requirements, and face common process challenges and analytical hurdles.

Rave Reviews

“Hands down, best applied, analytics conference I have ever attended. Great exposure to cutting-edge predictive techniques and I was able to turn around and apply some of those learnings to my work immediately. I’ve never been able to say that after any conference I’ve attended before!”

Jon Francis
Senior Statistician
T-Mobile

Read more:  Articles and blog entries about February and October’s PAW can be found at www.predictiveanalyticsworld.com/pressroom.php

People Who Need People

Vendors:

*    Meet the vendors and learn about their solutions, software and services
*    Discover the best predictive analytics vendors available to serve your needs
*    Learn what they do and see how they compare

Colleagues

*    Mingle, network and hang out with your best and brightest colleagues
*    Exchange experiences over lunch, coffee breaks and the conference reception connecting with those professionals who face the same challenges as you

Get Started

If you’re new to predictive analytics, kicking off a new initiative, or exploring new ways to position it at your organization, there’s no better place to get your bearings than Predictive Analytics World.  See what other companies are doing, witness vendor demos, participate in discussions with the experts, network with your colleagues and weigh your options!

For more information, see:
www.predictiveanalyticsworld.com

For a complete overview of the conference agenda, see:
www.predictiveanalyticsworld.com/sanfrancisco/2010/agenda_overview.php

Be sure to register by September 10th for the Early Bird rate (save $200):
www.predictiveanalyticsworld.com/register.php

Save more with this posting’s promotional offer:  Take an additional $150 off the Early Bird – a total savings of $350 – or the regular registration fee with this registration discount code: AOH150

What is predictive analytics?  See the Predictive Analytics Guide:
www.predictiveanalyticsworld.com/predictive_analytics.php

If you’d like our informative event updates, sign up at:
www.predictiveanalyticsworld.com/notifications.php

To sign up for the PAW group on LinkedIn, see:
www.linkedin.com/e/gis/1005097

For inquiries e-mail registration@predictiveanalyticsworld.com or call (717) 798-3495.

Movie Review : Rajneeti (Politics)

When one of the oldest action stories in the world, the Mahabharata ( a Sanskrit epic is mashed together with some inspired Michael Corleone like scenes from the Godfather) the result is another hearland drama from Prakash Jha. With an ensemble cast from Nasseerudin Shah, to Nana Patekar, Manoj Bajpai, Ajay Devgan with some inspired acting from Arjun Rampal, Katrina Kaif and Ranbir Kapoor- this one is worth a dekko at a theatre near you. With twists and turns, almost very little music, and action galore along with dramatic scenes subtly mixed in a chutney flavor- Rajneeti shows Politics at its worst and Bollywood movie making  at it’s best.

and yes Katrina Kaif does look like Sonia Gandhi, but the story is clearly influenced from Karna and Duryodhana from the Mahabharata, and if you are a movie buff you would snicker at the Godfather scenes (like the breaking of the jaw at the hospital, the dead horse er body in the bed etc). This one is the latest hit here in India.

SAS Early Days

From Anthony Barr, creator of SAS language at

http://www.barrsystems.com/about_us/the_company/sas_history.asp

and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SAS_(software)#Early_history_of_SAS

A fascinating Proc by Proc read of who created what in those days. Quite easily some of the best work was coded in the 1970’s by Sall, Goodnight and Barr et al.

SAS Related History

SAS Beginnings talk at NCSU April 21, 2010

Sept 1962 – May 1963 Began assistantship with North Carolina State University Computing Center. I was assigned to work with the Statistics Department.

Created general analysis of variance program controlled by analysis of variance language similar to the notation of Kendal. Program was written on IBM 1410 assembler. Dr. A. Grandage, author of IBM 650 analysis of variance programs, advised on Analysis of Variance calculations. “Statistical programs for the IBM 650-Part I, Communications of the ACM, Volume 2, Issue 8”
June – Aug 1963 Summer fellowship in Physical Oceanography, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute
Sept 1963 – May 1964 Resumed assistantship with North Carolina State Computing Center. Wrote multiple regression program with a compiler that generated machine code for transforming data. Dr. A. Grandage advised on the Doolittle procedure for inverting matrices.
June 1964 – May 1966 Employed with IBM Federal Systems Division at the Pentagon, Washington. DC.

I was assigned to work with the National Military Command Center, the information processing branch of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Project: Rewrite and enhance the Formatted File System, a generalized data based management system for retrieval and report writing.

Implemented three of the five major components: retrieval, sorting, and file update.

Innovated the idea of a uniform Lexical Analyzer for all languages in the system with a uniform method of handling all error messages within the system.

With the experience in this environment, I saw the power of the self-defining file for providing overall structure to the information processing world.

It became obvious that I could put statistical procedures in the same formatted file framework. At the same time, manuals for PL/1 appeared in the IBM library. The Lexical design of PL/l was an improvement over that used in the Formatted File System.
June 1966 I was recruited by North Carolina State University Statistics Department to rewrite analysis of variance and regression programs for the IBM 360.

I saw this as an opportunity to develop the Statistical Analysis System (SAS).

I wrote the analysis of variance program while independently developing the SAS software for inputting and transforming data.
Sept 1966 Presented conceptual ideas of SAS to members of the Committee on Statistical Software of the University Statisticians of Southeast Experiment Station (USSERS). The meeting was held in Athens, GA. Individuals present:

Frank Verlinden, North Carolina State University

Anthony J. Barr, North Carolina State University

Walt Drapula, Mississippi State University

Jim Fortson, University of Georgia
January 1968 Jim Goodnight and I cooperated in putting his regression program into SAS.

This procedure was invaluable to pharmaceutical and agricultural scientists in analysis of experiments with missing data.

Barr:
Developed language for describing regression and analysis of variance model, and preprocessor for creating dummy variables

Goodnight:
Developed regression and statistical routines that made practical the analysis of variance methodology within the regression framework
August 1972 Release of 1972 version of SAS. This was the first release to achieve wide distribution. SAS was now recognized as a major system in statistical computing.

Credits for SAS 72 as described in SAS 76 Users Guide:

Anthony J. Barr
Language translator; data management and supervisor; ANOVA, DUNCAN, FACTOR, GUTTMAN, INBREED, LATTICE, NESTED, PLAN, PRINT, RANK, SORT, SPEARMAN

James H. Goodnight
CANCORR, CORR, DISCRIM, MEANS, PLOT, PROBIT, REGR, RSQUARE, RQUE, STANDARD, STEPWISE.

Jolayne W. Service
“A User’s Guide to the Statistical Analysis System”

Carroll G. Perkins
HARVEY, HIST, PRTPCH: A Guide to the Supplementary Procedures Library for the Statistical Analysis System

37,000 total lines of code with distribution:

  • Barr ………………….65%
  • Goodnight …………..32%
  • Others…………………3%

I had developed and implemented the language, data management, and interface to operating system.
June 1973 – May 1976 I rewrote the internals of SAS: Data Management, report writing and the compiler.

John Sall joined us in 1973 (approx.).
June 1976 Release of 1976 version of SAS.

The 76 version was a functionally complete system for statistical computing and business data analysis.

I wrote the systems portion of the software.

Credits in the SAS 1976 manual:

Anthony J. Barr
Language translator; data management and supervisor; GUTTMAN, NESTED, PRINT, SORT

James H. Goodnight
ANOVA, CLUSTER, DISCRIM, GLM. MEANS, NEIGHBOR, NLIN, PROBIT, RSQUARE, STANDARD, STEPWISE, TTEST, VARCOMP

John P. Sall
AUTOREG, BMDP, CONTENTS, CORR, DUNCAN, EDITOR, FACTOR, FREQ, MATRIX, OPTIONS, PLAN, RANK, SA572, SCORE, SPECTRA, SYSREG, function library

Jane T. Helwig
“A User’s Guide to SAS 76”

Carroll G. Perkins (consultant)
CONVERT, SCATTER

67,000 total lines of code with distribution:

  • Barr ……………………35%
  • Goodnight …………….18%
  • Sall……………………..43%
June 1976 SAS Institute, Inc. was incorporated.

Principals and percentage of ownership:

  • Anthony J. Barr ……..40%
  • James H. Goodnight ..35%
  • John Sall ……………..17%
  • Jane Helwig ……………8%
January 1979 I resigned from SAS Institute

Copyright © 2006 Anthony J. Barr

Certifications in Analytics and Business Intelligence

I sometimes get a chat message on Twitter/ Facebook asking for help on some specific data issue. More often than not it is something like – How do I get started in BI/BA /Data stuff. So here is a list of certifications which I think are quite nice as beginning points or even CV multipliers.

[tweetmeme=”Decisionstats”]

1) Google’s Certifications

http://www.google.com/intl/en/adwords/professionals/

2) SAS Certifications

Quite well established and easily one of the best structured certification programs in the industry.

http://support.sas.com/certify/index.html

3) SPSS

The SPSS certification began last year and it helps provide a valuable skill set for both your practice as well as your resume. Also useful to have a second skill set apart from SAS in terms of statistical software.

http://www.spss.com/certification/

At this point I would like you to pause and think if the above certifications are useful or cost  effective for you as they are broadly general qualifications in statistical platforms as well as in applying them for the web analytics ( a key area for business analytics).

For more specialized certifications here are some more-

1) Microsoft SQL Server

http://www.microsoft.com/learning/en/us/certification/cert-sql-server.aspx

2) TDWI Certification

http://tdwi.org/pages/certification/index.aspx

3) IBM

Not sure how updated these are so caveat emptor!

http://www.redbooks.ibm.com/abstracts/sg245747.html

If you are knowledgeable about IBM’s Business Intelligence solutions and the fundamental concepts of DB2 Universal Database, and you are capable of performing the intermediate and advanced skills required to design, develop, and support Business Intelligence applications

Also IBM Cognos Certifications

http://www-01.ibm.com/software/data/education/cognos-cert.html

4) MicroStrategy

http://www.microstrategy.com/education/Certification/

5) Oracle

Included the all new Sun Certifications as well.

http://certification.oracle.com/

and http://blogs.oracle.com/certification/

6) SAP Certifications

http://www.sap.com/services/education/certification/index.epx

7) Cloudera’s Hadoop Certification

http://www.cloudera.com/developers/learn-hadoop/hadoop-certification/

These are some Business Intelligence and Business Analytics related certifications that I assembled in a list. Many other programs were either too software development specific or did not have a certification for general usage (like many R trainings or company tool specific trainings). Please feel free to add in any suggestions.

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