Python Tutorial Program: Using a Markov Analysis to Produce Randomly Generated Text

Link to the program: https://github.com/kburchfiel/markov_analysis             My 3rd semester at Columbia Business School starts next week. Before registering for classes, I needed to look through lots of online course descriptions to figure out which ones appealed to me the most.             Meanwhile, I had learned about Markov analyses through the book Think Python by Allen …

Google Slides Image Uploader:

A Python Program to Help Automate Google Slides Image Uploads Link to repository: https://github.com/kburchfiel/google_slides_image_uploader To see a video of this program in action, visit https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vzr3K8mqvnE. This summer, I imported sets of graphs into various Google Slides presentations. These graphs changed frequently over the course of the summer due to data and formatting updates, so I …

Python Tutorial Program: Retrieving U.S. Census Data

Link to the program and the datasets it created: https://github.com/kburchfiel/census_query_tutorial The US Census Bureau is a great source of freely available information for data analysis projects. Python is not only a useful tool for performing these analyses, but also an excellent option for retrieving US Census data to begin with. A major benefit of using …

Finding a laptop with a high-TDP RTX 3080 with 16GB of VRAM; support for at least 64 GB of RAM; and an 11th-gen 8-core i7+ processor

My new Gigabyte Aorus 15P YD laptop--one of the few I found that met my rather stringent requirements I spend more time on my laptop than I care to admit, and I planned to use my next laptop for a number of processor- and graphics-intensive tasks, such as 8K video editing; playing Microsoft Flight Simulator …

Python Tutorial Program: Organizing Regression Results into a DataFrame, then Plotting the Regression Coefficients as a Grouped Bar Chart

Link to program (released under the MIT license): https://github.com/kburchfiel/regression_tables_and_graphs Earlier this summer, I created a tutorial program (described here) that demonstrates how Python can be used to convert a dataset into pivot tables and grouped line charts. In this new program, I show how Python can make it easy to perform regressions on a dataset, …

My Recipe for a Delicious, Undiluted Pina Colada (With or Without Rum)

The pina colada, virgin or spiked, is a fantastic frozen drink that I count among my all-time favorites. However, it’s often prepared using ice, which diminishes the flavor of the drink. Therefore, I decided to create a recipe that uses frozen pineapple juice in place of water. The benefit of this approach is that, even …

How to add a second internal SSD to your laptop, then make it the primary C: drive using Macrium

So far, I’ve been quite happy with my Gigabyte Aorus 15P YD. However, after installing a number of programs on it, I had only about 34% of the 1TB SSD free to use. Therefore, I decided to buy a second (2TB) Gen4 SSD, the Seatagate FireCuda 520. This drive, like the one that comes with …

Python Tutorial Program: Creating Pivot Tables (With Subtotal Rows) and Grouped Line Charts

One of the graphs produced by the tutorial program. The scenario and data are both fictional. Kenneth Burchfiel Link to program (released under the MIT license): https://github.com/kburchfiel/pivot_tables_and_graphs_tutorial For me, one major benefit of using Python is that blocks of code can automatically produce tables and graphs that I would need to build manually in Excel. …

Using Python to Create Scatter Plots, Correlation Matrices, Brute-Force Best Subsets Regressions, and Predictions

April 24, 2021 Link to program discussed in this post on GitHub: https://github.com/kburchfiel/happiness_plots_and_regressions (The program is released under the MIT license.) My formula for generating all possible subsets of a list of variables, which proved useful for performing a best subsets analysis I recently finished my first year of MBA studies at Columbia Business School. …

Using Python to Perform Hundreds of Regressions in Seconds

Program link: https://github.com/kburchfiel/iv_subset_comparison During my first semester of my MBA program, I exclusively used Excel when I needed to perform a regression analysis. Excel’s regression interface is easy to use and doesn’t take long to set up. However, the utility of using Excel for regressions has its limits. Consider a dataset with 7 independent variables …