When to use Excel, when to use R?

Re:When to use Excel, when to use R? by vtail on Saturday April 17, 2010 @02:54PM (#1273500)

The arguments are good, assuming you're the only person working on the analysis.

As a consultant I'm always constrained to use the greatest common denominator - that is, something that my clients can use, modify and extend themselves after I leave. In 99.9% of the cases, that means Excel, regardless of the task.

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Re:When to use Excel, when to use R? by secretasiandan on Saturday April 17, 2010 @02:58PM (#1273511)

While your clients need to look at the output of the analysis or the end result, they don't need to see every branch of it that you have explored.

I will do serious exploratory analysis in R and then show my conclusions and maybe a few alternatives in Excel, but that doesn't mean you have to always work in Excel. Further, I could not be anywhere near as productive in Excel as I could in R.

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Re:When to use Excel, when to use R? by vtail on Saturday April 17, 2010 @03:42PM (#1273586)

More often than not people are interested in tools and ability to generate answers themselves, not just answers.

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Re:When to use Excel, when to use R? by uuid on Saturday April 17, 2010 @03:50PM (#1273602)

A very valid point.

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