David Seah's 2010 Compact Calendar
David Seah has updated his Compact Calendar for 2010 and posted it for download (both XLS and PDF versions) on his website: Compact Calendar 2010. At that link you’ll also find numerous international versions and last year’s version, too. [Note: If you feel compelled to spend $50 on a more typographically pleasing calendar, visit aisleone and slap your dough down on the table. I'll stick with Mr. Seah's solution. Thanks to him for making it available gratis.]
barcode example (converted to png)
In keeping track of my books, I have been looking for a simple way to generate barcodes as individual graphics that I could embed in my book list. I think I’ve found it: Dan Bornstein’s Barcode Server, which I found at the BarcodesInc’s UPC/EAN Barcode Generator.While the online version is nice, I wanted something a little more flexible and robust, so I downloaded the C source code.
» Read more: Create and Use Barcodes to Simplify Your Book List
Snapshot of the Typekit Kit Editor
I just updated the site with 2 new fonts from Typekit: Chunk for the headers and Droid Serif for the body copy. You can also see which faces I’m using. Although it’s an experiment for now, the potential looks tremendous. After I read that the Harvard Business Publishing is using Typekit on their HBR website, hbr.org, I thought it would be worth a trial run. What are the benefits? How much does it cost?
A very handy guide to Eclipse keyboard shortcuts: 10 Eclipse Navigation Shortcuts Every Java Programmer Should Know « The Curious Schemer.
It always amazes me how dependent everyone is on the mouse, even old school Un*x programmers. For better or worse, I love the keyboard and keyboard shortcuts — it is easier to do something in the IDE if I can keep my fingers close to the keys, you know, how the code is typed in. This article, from The Curious Schemer, is a great list of keyboard shortcuts. The comments have even more. Do yourself a favor and invest a few minutes learning these — they’ll save you a lot of time in the long run.
Catherine Mulbrandon's Data Scientest capabilities (per steps by Ben Fry; from http://www.visualizingeconomics.com/2009/07/12/data-scienist-data-geek-designer/)
Catherine Mulbrandon took Ben Fry’s 7 steps of data the Data Scientest steps (from his PhD dissertation (page 30 etc), dated 1997 and reiterated in his Visualizing Data book, as he describes on his website) and graphed her own ability levels in each area.
Clever use of the original ideas, along with some additional “Testing” inserts of her own. In fact, as a programmer, I would argue for testing between each of these 7 steps. I wouldn’t dare use data (from step 1) without validating it, nor move to step 3 without ensuring that step 2 hadn’t trashed the data. Indeed, each step assumes a solid foundation from the earlier steps, though, as Mr. Fry mentions, the steps are largely iterative, not linear. True, thankfully.
[Thanks to DataVisualization.ch for the link.]
The New York Times just announced the NYT API Tool on their website. Geared toward making use of their API easier, the web interface shows the options, allows for setting custom parameters, and facilitates pulling data from their site as easy as possible. For real use, you’ll need a key, but once you have it, you can pull data from their site programmatically. It won’t be as easy as their API Tool, but at least you can make more calls with fewer keystrokes.
Interested in their API, but don’t know how to program? Know how to program, but don’t know if it’ll be worth the effort? Either way, give their API tool a shot.
[Thanks to DataVisualization.ch for the link.]
I had the pleasure of attending the Seminar on Innovative Approaches to Turn Statistics into Knowledge, hosted by the US Census Bureau, the World Bank, and the OECD. While Robert Kosara, from UNC Charlotte, has a fairly thorough review (but not focusing on the technical aspects) of the seminar, and I would agree with most of his points (except for the presentation by David Spiegelhalter and Mike Pearson; their presentation was geared toward (and succeeded in) linking data with decision making), I didn’t read much about the technical side of things, so I thought I’d cover those areas here.
Here’s the low-down:
» Read more: Turning Statistics Into Knowledge: Seminar Review and Notes
While I’m no statistician, I’ve enjoyed dabbling in R and appreciate its simplicity and power. Take the LOESS function, for example. It’s built in to R. Excel needs a plug-in. Wow. Gotta love R. Used to love Excel, then I grew up (just a little 
