This chapter covers several topics that relate to basic statistical techniques. For the most part, these recipes build on those described in earlier chapters, such as the summary techniques discussed in Chapter 7. The examples here thus show additional ways to apply the material from those chapters. Broadly speaking, the topics discussed in this chapter include:
Statistics covers such a large and diverse array of topics that this chapter necessarily only scratches the surface, and simply illustrates a few of the potential areas in which MySQL may be applied to statistical analysis. Note that some statistical measures can be defined in different ways (for example, do you calculate standard deviation based on n degrees of freedom, or n-1?). For that reason, if the definition I use for a given term doesn't match the one you prefer, you'll need to adapt the queries or algorithms shown here to some extent.
You can find scripts related to the examples discussed here in the stats directory of the recipes distribution, and scripts for creating some of the example tables in the tables directory.
Using the mysql Client Program
Writing MySQL-Based Programs
Record Selection Techniques
Working with Strings
Working with Dates and Times
Sorting Query Results
Generating Summaries
Modifying Tables with ALTER TABLE
Obtaining and Using Metadata
Importing and Exporting Data
Generating and Using Sequences
Using Multiple Tables
Statistical Techniques
Handling Duplicates
Performing Transactions
Introduction to MySQL on the Web
Incorporating Query Resultsinto Web Pages
Processing Web Input with MySQL
Using MySQL-Based Web Session Management
Appendix A. Obtaining MySQL Software
Appendix B. JSP and Tomcat Primer
Appendix C. References