IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/h/spr/sprchp/978-1-4613-8560-8_10.html
   My bibliography  Save this book chapter

Statistical Computing: What’s Past is Prologue

In: A Celebration of Statistics

Author

Listed:
  • William F. Eddy
  • James E. Gentle

Abstract

We sketch an outline of statistical computation, an arena of increasing importance in statistics. Its roots are in the numerical analysis of statistical techniques, and its leaves are nearly everywhere that statisticians go. After an introduction which covers the short history of statistical computing, we discuss in some detail the various areas of statistics which have been affected by computers. The most important need of statisticians interested in using computers is software that works; we consider the possible sources of software and discuss the validity of computer programs. The currently faster-growing area in statistical computation is that of graphics; we briefly discuss the past, present, and future of statistical graphics. One of the most important statistical uses of computing power is to run simulations, and we discuss the Monte Carlo method and the problems of generating random numbers. Finally we address the revolution that is occuring with the advent of inexpensive microcomputers. There are obviously a myriad of benefits, but we mention a few cautions.

Suggested Citation

  • William F. Eddy & James E. Gentle, 1985. "Statistical Computing: What’s Past is Prologue," Springer Books, in: Anthony C. Atkinson & Stephen E. Fienberg (ed.), A Celebration of Statistics, chapter 0, pages 233-249, Springer.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:sprchp:978-1-4613-8560-8_10
    DOI: 10.1007/978-1-4613-8560-8_10
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    To our knowledge, this item is not available for download. To find whether it is available, there are three options:
    1. Check below whether another version of this item is available online.
    2. Check on the provider's web page whether it is in fact available.
    3. Perform a
    for a similarly titled item that would be available.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:sprchp:978-1-4613-8560-8_10. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.