Comparing R, Octave, and Python for Data Analysis

Posted by Soulskill on Wednesday May 23, 2012 @08:11AM from the data-analysis-just-wants-to-be-free dept.

Here is a breakdown of R, Octave and Python, and how analysts can rely on open-source software and online learning resources to bring data-mining capabilities into their companies. The article breaks down which of the three is easiest to use, which do well with visualizations, which handle big data the best, etc. The lack of a budget shouldn't prevent you from experiencing all the benefits of a top-shelf data analysis package, and each of these options brings its own set of strengths while being much cheaper to implement than the typical proprietary solutions.

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Re:Never selected that way by Anonymous Coward · 2012-05-23 10:24 · Score: 5, Insightful

I'm an astronomer. At this point in my career, I move to a new research institution every couple of years. Each institution may have a site licence for some piece of commercial software like IDL or Matlab, but I use free software (Python, in my case) because I know that I can keep using it, rather than rewriting all my scripts for a new language every time I move.