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4.12: Sidebar- What is data science?

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    Sidebar: What is data science?

    Data science takes structured and unstructured data and uses scientific methods, processes, algorithms, and systems to extract knowledge and insight. It begins by procuring data from many sources such as web servers, logs, databases, APIs (application program interface), and online repositories. Once the acquisition has happened, the data must be cleaned and pipeline data. This is done by sorting and organizing relevant and usable data; this is the transformation process. Data Modeling is next; the goal is to create the best modeling that suits the company's needs when using the data. This can be done using metrics, algorithms, and analytics. The goal is to progress to AI and deep learning or machine learning. Data science problem solves company issues using data.

    • Structured Data - Is data that is found in a fixed field within a record or file. It includes data contained in relational databases and spreadsheets. Such as:
      • Date
      • Time
      • Census Data
      • Facebook “Likes”
    • Unstructured Data - Is information that is not organized and does not have a pre-defined model. Such as:
      • Body of emails
      • Tweets
      • Facebook Status
      • Video Transcripts

    What is data analytics?

    Data Analytics takes raw data gathered from data mining and analyzes the information to uncover relationships and patterns to find insight into the data when using it. Companies use these analytics to optimize problem-solving and assist in decision-making. The information is helpful to understand who your consumer is as well as marketing your company or product. This is all helpful to create efficiency and streamline operations. Data continuously being collected can then be adjusted as new criteria happen. Today's data analytics are deeper, larger in abundance, and retrieved quicker than yesteryear. The information is more accurate and detailed, which accelerates successful problem-solving.

    Image of flow of information in numbers and letters going into infinity of a black background Image by xresch from Pixabay cc-by-sa-2.0 https://pixabay.com/illustrations/analytics-information-innovation-3088958/
    Figure \(\PageIndex{1}\): Analytic information. Image by xresch from Pixabay is licensed CC BY-SA 2.0

    Business Intelligence and Business Analytics

    This is now a new trend. With tools such as data warehousing and data mining at their disposal, businesses learn how to use the information to their advantage. The term business intelligence is used to describe how organizations use to take data they are collecting and analyze it to obtain a competitive advantage. Besides using data from their internal databases, firms often purchase information from data brokers to understand their industries' big-picture understanding. Business analytics is the term used to describe internal company data to improve business processes and practices.

    This page titled 4.12: Sidebar- What is data science? is shared under a CC BY 3.0 license and was authored, remixed, and/or curated by Ly-Huong T. Pham, Tejal Desai-Naik, Laurie Hammond, & Wael Abdeljabbar (ASCCC Open Educational Resources Initiative (OERI)) .