As mentioned in Chapter 1, Transitioning from Data Developer to Data Scientist, the idea of how data science is defined is a matter of opinion.
I personally like the explanation that data science is a progression or, even better, an evolution of thought or steps, as shown in the following figure:
This data science evolution (depicted in the preceding figure) consists of a series of steps or phases that a data scientist tracks, comprising the following:
- Collecting data
- Processing data
- Exploring and visualizing data
- Analyzing (data) and/or applying machine learning (to data)
- Deciding (or planning) based on acquired insight
Although a progression or evolution implies a sequential journey, in practice, this is an extremely fluid process; each of the phases may inspire the data scientist to reverse and repeat one or more of the phases until they are...
