An introduction to data mining

This webpage, produced by Kurt Thearling, provides an extensive overview of data mining and its applications. The page includes specific examples and links to a tutorial and research papers on data mining.

"Data mining, the extraction of hidden predictive information from large databases, is a powerful new technology with great potential to help companies focus on the most important information in their data warehouses. Data mining tools predict future trends and behaviors, allowing businesses to make proactive, knowledge-driven decisions. The automated, prospective analyses offered by data mining move beyond the analyses of past events provided by retrospective tools typical of decision support systems. Data mining tools can answer business questions that traditionally were too time consuming to resolve. They scour databases for hidden patterns, finding predictive information that experts may miss because it lies outside their expectations." (Thearling, 2010)

Contents

• The Foundations of Data Mining
• The Scope of Data Mining
• How Data Mining Works
• An Architecture for Data Mining
• Profitable Applications