I started using statistical software with the commercial product S+ when I obtained a new HP735 workstation. We kept the S+ license going for a number of years until I heard about R. It was an easy transition and because I have been proficient in fortran and perl, the scripting came naturally--except for some syntax similarities/differences between perl and R interacting with a natural tendency towards dyslexia.

I especially like that I can slice and dice the data to ferret out relationships e.g., concentration by hour of day, by month, by wind speed, by wind direction--love those boxplots.

I also find that even the default settings produce some pretty attractive plots that are useable in many settings--I've also produced some pretty awful ones.

And the price always reminds me that I need to find every way possible to contribute to the overall good--I've forgotten too much of my fortran and C programming skills to contribute directly to the R Project.

Clint

--
Clint Bowman                    INTERNET:       cl...@ecy.wa.gov
Air Quality Modeler             INTERNET:       cl...@math.utah.edu
Department of Ecology           VOICE:          (360) 407-6815
PO Box 47600                    FAX:            (360) 407-7534
Olympia, WA 98504-7600

On Thu, 25 Feb 2010, Ralf B wrote:

My biggest blocker was my misconception that R is extremely difficult
to start with. It is powerful and one can do very complicated things (
that consequently turn things  complicated) but it comes with very
nice defaults and one can produce great results with standard tasks in
very little time - especially if one has done programming and/or
scripting before.

I pushed it away for too long that way. I wish I would have used it
years ago and avoided SPSS altogether - must have wasted 100s of hours
doing repetitive tasks by click and partial scripts in SPSS. Not to
mention a horrible license policy and a visualization unit that is
simply embarrassing for a product that is in its 18th or 19th version.

Ralf

On Thu, Feb 25, 2010 at 1:11 PM, Tal Galili <tal.gal...@gmail.com> wrote:
My biggest stumbling blocks to getting up and running with R was whenever I
was lazy and impatient.

The more you love R, the more it loves you back.

Tal




----------------Contact
Details:-------------------------------------------------------
Contact me: tal.gal...@gmail.com |  972-52-7275845
Read me: www.talgalili.com (Hebrew) | www.biostatistics.co.il (Hebrew) |
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On Thu, Feb 25, 2010 at 7:31 PM, Patrick Burns <pbu...@pburns.seanet.com>wrote:

* What were your biggest misconceptions or
stumbling blocks to getting up and running
with R?

* What documents helped you the most in this
initial phase?

I especially want to hear from people who are
lazy and impatient.

Feel free to write to me off-list.  Definitely
write off-list if you are just confirming what
has been said on-list.

--
Patrick Burns
pbu...@pburns.seanet.com
http://www.burns-stat.com
(home of 'The R Inferno' and 'A Guide for the Unwilling S User')

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