Linux Workshops

NOTE - The Linux Workshops are no longer being presented. This page is being retained so that we can remember the links to the materials used in previous workshops. You may be interested in the The Statistical Computing Series as an alternative.

2011

2010

2009

Suggestions for topics

  • Source Control
  • Using Command Line Tools
  • Collaborative Academic Writing - see this Slashdot conversation for some interesting discussion.
  • "Good Programming Tips for Statisticians - 90% of what we do as statisticians is programming yet most of us have received little formal training in programming. Update - We've created the page Programming Tips For Statisticians, which contains a lot of great tips on fundamentals.
  • "Good Data Management Tips for Statisticians - Another huge part of what we do a statisticians is manage data. We're trained on pre-cleaned, small, simple datasets. We're only learning how to handle big messy data structures by experience after we graduate. Good advice here could save us a lot of growing pains."
  • Helpful alias tricks and .bashrc
  • Directory and email folder organization for efficient work
  • Life cycle of a data set from arrival to analysis
  • Advanced Time Management: how to bring Mozilla, Webcalendar, Korganizer, and your Palm Pilot together
  • Application Awareness: what are my choices and where do I find them?
  • OpenOffice: what makes it so great?
  • Present This: OpenOffice Impress (possible incorporate this with OpenOffice)
  • Power Printing: kprinter, xprinter, cups, oopadmin, lp/lpr etc. - how does this [not] work together?
  • Mounting Madness: learn better ways to mount, including USB devices
  • Random Bytes of Information: cover a plethora of topics (email features, web browsing, creating short cuts)
  • "Why Computers Are Bad At Math"
Here are two math problems all of us can do with pen and paper.

What is 10^16 + 1 ?
What is exp(15*log(10)) ?

But R gets these wrong.

> options(scipen=20)
> 10^16 + 1
[1] 10000000000000000
> exp(15*log(10))
[1] 1000000000000006

Why is that?

We use computers for all of our analyses, but most of us don't really understand how computers store and process numbers, let alone how R stores and processes numbers, so we're surprised when we see things like R mess up a simple math problem."

  • DONEModding Mozilla: themes & extensions can make Firefox and Thunderbird more attractive
  • DONEBurning Desire: K3B can/sometimes/everyonce-in-a-while can be real useful for burning CDs
  • DONEPDF viewers: options and printing
  • DONEWeb calendar
  • DONEWork-from-Home options and accessing files
    • Rsync
    • From KDE/Linux, mounting Windows shares
  • DONEIntroduction to OpenOffice

Ideas for Software Training

  • Linux OS: learning the OS
  • Learning LaTeX: howto, best practices, examples (with use of Kile)
  • The Access Alternative: MySql and sql statements; how OO can help
  • Batch Jobs: introduction to Perl, Python, and shell (BASH) scripts; how to run/check background jobs

2008

2007

  • GutsyInstall - Wednesday 28 Nov 2007
  • Kubuntu User's Guide - Wednesday 31 Oct 2007
  • A presentation on Linux text utilities - Wednesday 26 Sep 2007
  • Regular Expressions - TBD
  • More Biostatistics TWiki - Wednesday, April 25 (1:30-2:30pm, MRBIII 1220)
  • SAS for Linux - Wednesday, March 28
  • Wednesday, February 28
    • KDE Desktop Environment, presented by Jeff Horner; KDE is the desktop manager that we use on our Linux workstations in Biostatistics. Jeff will give an overview of KDE and talk about how to best use its features.
  • Rhubarb - Wednesday, January 31
    • DBConnect, presented by Cole Beck; Cole is the developer of DBConnect which is the online administrative tool used in Biostatistics. DBConnect is used for grant management, purchase requests, vacation and sick time reporting, etc. This tool is in daily use and almost daily development. Cole will give a short overview and describe some new features that have been added recently.

2006

2005


Topic attachments
I Attachment Action Size Date WhoSorted ascending Comment
linux20091026.pdfpdf linux20091026.pdf manage 492.5 K 28 Oct 2009 - 14:39 CharlesDupont  
Raconteur.pdfpdf Raconteur.pdf manage 265.7 K 03 Nov 2010 - 16:40 UnknownUser  
Topic revision: r79 - 09 Apr 2014, DalePlummer
 

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