R, or
GNU-S, is a free (note there is no qualification, it is completely
free) statistical package that provides an impressive array of
methods for data analysis, interpretation, and graphical display.
Based on the S language first developed by Bell Labs decades ago, it is
quite simply the most advanced of what we have access to of the general
purpose packages for academic research, and for anyone wanting to keep
up with the times it is the package of choice, bar none.
You can download the above video by clicking the
following link: What is R?
R however does take a bit
to become comfortable with compared to some packages as it is primarily
command line driven, and as such we are willing to go the extra mile
for those who would like to learn it and use it for their research
purposes. However, it should be stressed that one can use it in a
very applied fashion, only taking from it what is necessary for the
data situation at hand and there are many packages that offer dropdown
menu capability. In other words, you do not have to become a
computer programmer to take advantage of its functionality. In
the end though, if you want to use methods that have been developed in
the last 30 years and take advantage of today's computing power, this
is the package for you, and the big packages like SAS and SPSS lag far
behind its capabilities for the academic researcher.
S-Plus can be seen as a
proprietary version of the S language, with its most noticeable
difference being that it comes with a sophisticated gui out of the
box. S-Plus and R are very compatible with one another in most
respects, however R has near daily updates and many, many more packages
and offerings.
Other notes:
You do not have to
come to us to obtain R. It is free to all.
SPSS, starting with
version 16, now has the ability to run R scripts as long as R version
2.5 (or newer) is installed on the machine. However, if you know
how to use R, there is little to no reason to use SPSS.
Student
Edition- This version of S-Plus has a 20,000
cell or 1,000 row limitation; is only for educational use; is good for
only one year; and is a rather large download (100+ meg).
If you prefer a cd one can be
purchased at the bookstore.
S-PLUS Free Experimental
Libraries and User Contributed Libraries
