Historically, programming has not been considered a critical skill for sports scientists. However recently, with the emergence of advanced measurement techniques, which provide access to vast amounts of data, programming skills are increasingly in strong demand in sports science research. This newsgroup has therefore two main goals in mind.

First, the tutorial serves as a general introduction to the open source R stats package. The R software package is a language and environment for statistical computing and graphics with strong support within the statistical community. Many cutting edge statistical methods are available through R, unmatched by any commercially available statistical software package. Further, since R provides sophisticated graphical routines the package can be regarded as an all-purpose tool for data treatment in general. Thus, R provides a coherent framework for data exploration and analysis, statistical analysis, and eventual data presentation, unlike the patchwork of MS Excel, SPSS, and other software packages typically in use.

Second, since R is based on the S programming language, as a side effect the fundamentals of computer programming are introduced. Hence, the R software package serves as a “first” programming language and several complications, which are experienced with “pure” programming languages, can be avoided. The tutorial does not assume any prior experiences with any programming language. As there are many similarities between R and Matlab, this tutorial (with slight changes) may also be used with Matlab.

At the moment, the tutorials are set up, so that each session lasts only up to 10 minutes. Group member can download the tutorial file and go through the session straight away. Hence, accumulation of material for “later” can be avoided.
For any questions, requests or comments, please either post a message or send an email to:
gerrobrein@yahoo.com.au

Cheers
Rob