Subject archive for "practical-techniques"

Original content by Manojit Nandi - Updated by Josh Poduska.

This article delves into methods for analyzing multivariate and univariate time series data.

This article provides a brief introduction to natural language using spaCy and related libraries in Python.

This article provides an excerpt "Deep Reinforcement Learning" from the book, Deep Learning Illustrated by Krohn, Beyleveld, and Bassens. The article includes an overview of reinforcement learning theory with focus on the deep Q-learning. It also covers using Keras to construct a deep Q-learning network that learns within a simulated video game environment. Many thanks to Addison-Wesley Professional for the permission to excerpt the chapter.

A common applied statistics task involves building regression models to characterize non-linear relationships between variables. It is possible to fit such models by assuming a particular non-linear functional form, such as a sinusoidal, exponential, or polynomial function, to describe one variable's response to the variation in another. Unless this relationship is obvious from the outset, however, it involves possibly extensive model selection procedures to ensure the most appropriate model is retained. Alternatively, a non-parametric approach can be adopted by defining a set of knots across the variable space and use a spline or kernel regression to describe arbitrary non-linear relationships. However, knot layout procedures are somewhat ad hoc and can also involve variable selection. A third alternative is to adopt a Bayesian non-parametric strategy, and directly model the unknown underlying function. For this, we can employ Gaussian process models.