Data Mining: An Overview
by
Siva Ganesh
Massey University, Palmerston North

Data Mining is the process of extracting knowledge from large volumes of data. It may also be regarded as the science (or art) of discovering unexpected patterns, valuable structures and interesting relationships in large and complex databases. Fast computers and cheap storage makes it easier to extract useful information out of everything from supermarket buying patterns through banking, insurance and stock market trades to medical diagnostics and DNA homology searches. Data Mining is widely used for achieving organisational goals and allowing investigators to go beyond simple data queries and reporting, in order to understand why things happen and to manipulate what happens in the future. The field of Data Mining is having a major impact in business, industry and science, and it affords research opportunities for new methodological developments.

This presentation gives a brief overview of, what data mining is; who uses it; what distinguishes data mining from conventional statistical data analysis; commonly used data mining techniques; data mining software tools; and useful references including books, research articles, www resources, conferences, workshops etc..

Date received: May 8, 2002

Copyright © 2002 by the author(s). The author(s) of this document and the organizers of the conference have granted their consent to include this abstract in Atlas Conferences Inc. Document # cajj-06.